ARTIST STATEMENT

In 2005, I was awarded an artist fellowship to participate in an archeological dig in Darrington, Washington through Earthwatch and funded by the Ford Motor Company. With a group of scientists, artists and volunteers, I helped excavate a former homestead belonging to a Sauk-Suiattle tribe woman, her Norwegian immigrant husband and their children.

Because of the fast rate of decay in the damp woods of the Pacific Northwest and because the nearby river had changed its course, the excavation site had few stable landmarks with the notable exception of the enormous, old-growth cedar stumps. For a week, I helped locate, measure and map these ancient stumps ranging from 10-18' in diameter with a few reaching nearly twice that size.

Since this influential experience, my art has focused on tree stumps and, most often, recreating the form from reclaimed corrugated cardboard boxes. I am not only reconstructing the organic form from its original material, but drawing connections between past and present by creating a historical subject in a ubiquitous and contemporary material. These sculptures, like much of my work, is a commentary on consumerism and natural resource use.

My other sculptures, whether in glass, wood, steel or bronze, reflect my interest in science, nature, contemporary issues facing our society and the very point where people and the environment meet.