The End Of The Age Of Innocence On The Great Wave Off Kanagawa / Bas Relief paper mache tidal wave and plastic action figures riding the wave on surfboards and in boats / 8x8x3 ft / 2021
This piece was designed for the exhibition, ‘Earth on the Edge’, at Ceres Gallery NYC.
“It is inspired by the famous Japanese print by Hokusai titled, The Great Wave Off Kanagawa”,made around 1830. Hokusai’s wave was a metaphor in his time for the feared Western influence as Japan had recently opened its doors to the world for trade and tourism after being isolated for centuries. My version of his wave is about our current fear of what will result from climate change, specifically sea level rise, as a global community.”
PLASTIC GALACTIC / Single use plastic bottles, plastic wrap, trash bags, LED lighting / 10x20x2ft / 2021
Installation at the Philadelphia International Airport, Philadelphia PA
This piece commissioned by the Philadelphia International Airport will be in terminal C for 2021. It is comprised of approximately 2500 single use containers, trash bags and LED lights. It is about our wasteful culture and disrespect for Earth, our home, as imagined from the perspective of astronomical time frame.. where all things have time and space to recycle.
FOUNTAIN; LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR A COLLAPSED ECONOMY II / shopping cart, plastic containers, motorized pump, water/ 50x52x36 / 2020
This fountain made from trash and a crushed shopping cart was exhibited in the Icebox Project Space in Crane Arts, Philadelphia PA during election week Nov. 2020. In this exhibition about climate change and Corporate greed, mounted by the FEMA artists collaborative (Fear Environmental Meyham Ahead), the 3500 sq. ft. gallery space was flooded with water addressing sea level rise and viewers were given white rubber boots at the door to wade through this group exhibition.
See more about this event at http://www.Fematrocities.com
CONVERGENCE / Plastic gallon milk jugs, LED lights,motorized pump, water / 80x80x72 / 2019
Installation at the Independence Seaport Museum, FLOW Exhibition on the Delaware River, Philadelphia PA
“It isn't often that I get paid to execute a temporary art installation, but that's what the brains behind the exhibition FLOW set out to make happen. They asked for challenging work and paid artists to make it happen! I was super excited to be accepted as part of a group of artists being commissioned.
My proposal was based on an igloo form I had made a few years earlier from gallon jugs as an indoor piece. I always envisioned it on the water. I had talked to a friend about helping me float it down the Schuylkill river, but we never made it happen. When I saw the opportunity for FLOW, I quickly wrote a proposal, excited by the prospect of making a seaworthy Igloo. I added a pump to carry water from the Delaware up the inside of the Igloo though a small tube and shower down from the center of the interior, referencing sea ice melt and acknowledging all waters are connected through the flow from rain to river to sea and back again. The blue LED lighting connected to a solar panel on the top of the Igloo shone bright at night though the translucent jugs. I feel Convergence is inviting and expresses warmth, despite its commentary on our predicament with climate change, sea ice melt, plastic pollution, and the displacement of so many lives in our changing world.”
FOUNTAIN; LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR A COLLAPSED ECONOMY/ shopping cart, plastic containers, motorized pump, water/ 50x52x36 / 2018
SEA WORLD / Plastic bottle cap mosaic, on three plywood panels / 67x96x5
“This large work took three years to complete. I had to look through a mirror on the opposite wall of my studio to know where to place the pixel-like caps. Each cap is individually glued - layer upon layer. Nesting brightly colored caps of contrasting color inside each other creates an impressionistic field of earth tones when viewed from a distance. There are over 10,000 plastic caps total from all over the world.
The layering creates an undulating surface reminding me of the motion of the sea.”
EVOLUTION Motorized Kaleidoscope / Mixed Media / 62x24x53 / 2018
“I am interested in the notion of cycles. Recycling. I think about development, growth, decline, and subsequent regeneration into new physical form. I am particularly interested in the decline portion of the cycle, and the space between decline and subsequent regeneration, where the mysterious spiritual world is at work and the act of transformation is underway. My works are intended to be about the transformation of their material, where its original purpose lingers, but has changed.”
PUMPED / Motorized work, single use water bottles, fleece fabric, satin upholstery / 15x40x40 / 2011
“This was my first piece using plastic containers. In 2010 the Deepwater Horizon BP Oil spill disaster took place in the Gulf of Mexico. It remains the largest marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry. This was deeply disturbing, and prompted me to make a piece about, what looked to be, the death of the gulf. Each water bottle has a tiny motor and arm that grinds out the motion of an oil derrick. The bottles are housed in a tufted satin casing made to suggest a coffin, while also conjuring thoughts of luxury and human desire.”
GARBAGE PATCH / Plastic containers on canvas, on foam rubber, paint / 96x54x12 / 2011
“I create new life from waste reflecting back to viewer what nature does.
The piles of trash in my studio serve as metaphors for my personal version of chaos. My work is to tease out order and turn the wreckage into rebirth; trash into art.”
SINGLE STREAM INSTALLATION / 250 foot strand of painted plastic containers strung together on cord / 2012
Installation for “Art in the Open” Philadelphia PA
“My project for Art in the Open was to make a long strand of plastic containers that would stretch out alongside the bike path and the Schuylkill river. I had many passionate conversations about the impact of plastics on our environment, over consumption, the power of advertising, petroleum products and non renewable energy... and then, just some fun with kids. The strand eventually reached a length of 525 feet. It was interesting to watch people view it while they moved past. My piece became part of the movement of the city in my busy location, running parallel to a train track on one side, the path and the river on the other, and the expressway beyond the river, where I watched the brightly colored cars strung in slow moving lines like my Single Stream. Many passersby added their water bottles to the work.
I placed a plastic lobster at the start of the strand, and was pleased to find when I was finished someone had placed a plastic hermit crab cage at the other end.”
IGLOO / Plastic gallon milk jugs, LED lights / 51x60x60 / 2012
Installation at Woodmere Museum of Art, Philadelphia PA
Power in numbers…. “I enjoy the power of multiples. Surrounding one’s self with a repeated image reinforces that object’s impact, and speaks about the collective more than the individual.
”I enjoy the meditative quality of repetition in form, movement, and process. I am drawn to basic methods of construction.
Although I have recently challenged myself to work with small motors, sound, and light components, my hot glue gun, good shears,
a plastic riveter, and screw gun remain my favorite tools.”
SISTERS / plastic gallon milk jugs / variable sized wall art - this grouping 48x84x6 / 2013
“Every once in a while, a little effort makes a big splash. These inverted milk jugs are simply cut diagonally and the half with the handle is pushed up further into the bottom half, creating a life size head with some kind of headdress on. The faces are surprisingly individual I think, considering they are all stamped out mass-produced forms.
’Sisters’ is part of a series of works made specifically from plastic milk jugs. These works are intended to be about the unexpected transformation of their material, the milk jug, in which its purpose still exists, but has changed.”
INFANTA MARGARET / Painted plastic milk jugs; gallon, half gallon and quart / 35x17x19 / 2013
“‘Infanta Margaret’ was created for an exhibition celebrating Picasso’s 100th birthday at Porter Contemporary Gallery, NY, NY.
I chose to do a sculptural version of one of Picasso’s many painted versions of the young Spanish princess Margaret Theresa, which
the master painted after the famed, ‘Maids of Honor’, done in 1556 by the earlier great Spanish master, Valazquez.
The idea that my princess Margaret is made from trash while referencing artwork of the highest value, and royalty, brings into
question the monetary value we place on art.”
NOVA / Plastic bottles on speaker fabric, LED lights / 50x50x14 / 2016
“Always expressing thoughts about the destruction of our environment and civilization and the evils of the petroleum industry is no good for the soul. I am choosing in my recent work to focus on the bigger picture of geologic and astronomic time, acknowledging that we are only a blip on the surface of the Earth and her life span will continue and evolve despite our intervention. Mother earth will eventually integrate whatever we present her with for digestion. We are part of nature - not separate from it. Nothing we can create can be separate from it.”
ZEN GARDEN / interactive work / transparent plastics, sand, tools to make different arrangements / 100x72xVariable height / 2013
TRASH TALK (HEAD OF TRUMP) / Plastic milk jugs, detergent containers / 26x20x18 / 2017
LID / Mixed Media / 8x10x6 / 2014