I have been seeking to create a unique world of my own design, made from that I shun and that which I embrace, in which to immerse and protect myself. Maybe I am attempting to create my own Utopia…

Each individual’s experience of “place” emerges from a highly personal set of experiences, emotions and influences. While viewing art installations a changing, sensory experience occurs, with the only constants being the space occupied and time frame in which the installation occurs. Move the installation to a different actual space or time and the perception not only changes, but the physical is literally altered. I am fascinated with my ability as an artist to affect human experience.

The images that follow below cover multiple installations. The first is a permanent, viewer-interactive, public art installation commission I did for the Dallas Museum of Art; following that, a collaborative installation titled LAIR done with art group Sixfold Collective; based on the concept and form of a net, the exhibit addresses ideas of vulnerability and strength, of enclosure and openness, of capture and release, and of ephemeral accumulation. Viewers actually walk through the Lair and experience it in various visual formations.

In my solo exhibition of 2009 Beauty From the Beast I addressed the question, “What would happen if humans were wiped out?” via the U.S. Top Ten natural disasters: Pacific Northwest Megathrust Earthquake; N.Y.C. Hurricane; Asteroid Impact; L.A. Tsunami; Supervolcano; Midwest Earthquake; Heat Waves; East Coast Tsunami; Gulf Coast Tsunami and Total Destruction of Earth, using wry, massive, 2D stitched comic book-style pages and fantastical, 3D sculptural gardens and morphed creatures made of trash to make the point. Humans have destroyed nature in a never-ending quest to conquer and consume. In my vision their fortunate disappearance has left the world in a Post-Apocalyptic Reclamation state, thus causing organic matter left unchecked to morph with the detritus left behind, wryly paving the way to the formation of a fantastical world...without us. Viewers were able to stroll on the paths, move the bubble wrap flowers, play and escape…for a brief moment in time.

(in)CONSEQUENTIAL, my 2007 Master of Fine Arts exhibition, started off with my interpretation of little bits of nature and human detritus, served up in a sterile environment in tiny Petri dish tins, then moved on to medium-sized constructions I made to intimate those small objects (displayed next to the little bits in larger tins on ledges) to morph and grow into massive sculptural pieces that created a new world for viewers to interact with. For me, the best part of the exhibition was watching as both children and adults threw the old adage, “don’t touch the art” to the wind and rearranged the works. Two small children sat inside the grotto…

1. “Wild, dark times are rumbling toward us, and the prophet who wishes to write a new apocalypse will have to invent entirely new beasts, and beasts so terrible that the ancient animal symbols of Saint John will seem like cooing doves and cupids in comparison" - Johann Heinrich Heine, 1842 
   

*This gallery section has multiple pages! Please scroll and click on no.’s to turn the pages for more images!