Site Specific Installation at Voices from the Warehouse VI, Dubuque, IA, 2010
Water-SolubleWax Pastels on Masa Paper, wire, lighting
The empty second floor warehouse at 1000 Jackson evokesan ancient ordered grove of trees. Massive 13” wide, northernyellow pine pillars suggest trees placed at regular intervals. These are in fact tree trunks, planed by carpenters in thelast century. Branching out, both floor andceiling are made of wood. The site is the former home of wooden windowmanufacturing.
The print installation, Sacred Grove, references the natural source of the buildingmaterials and the commercial activity of the Wilmac Warehouse. Sacred Grove exhibits 30 life size paperreproductions of pillars in the main exhibition space. The natural wood graintexture along with scars from years of drills, nails, staple guns, etc. wastransferred to soft, fibrous paper by rubbing it with water-solublewax crayons. This is a technique often used to recordimpressions of gravestones. Here, centuries of natural history evidenced by thepillar’s wood grain are joined with the trace marks of recent industry andhuman labor. Rubbings with earth tone pigments echo tree colors. The forms areclosely placed in a natural, organic arrangement mimicking the original grove.Each column is internally illuminated with a battery operated light fixture. Theinterior space suggests a natural forest yet presents a ghostly presentation ofpaper columns in an industrial venue.
This work was funded in part with a grant from theIowa Arts Council, a division of the Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs, andthe National Endowment of the Arts.
The empty second floor warehouse at 1000 Jackson evokesan ancient ordered grove of trees. Massive 13” wide, northernyellow pine pillars suggest trees placed at regular intervals. These are in fact tree trunks, planed by carpenters in thelast century. Branching out, both floor andceiling are made of wood. The site is the former home of wooden windowmanufacturing.
The print installation, Sacred Grove, references the natural source of the buildingmaterials and the commercial activity of the Wilmac Warehouse. Sacred Grove exhibits 30 life size paperreproductions of pillars in the main exhibition space. The natural wood graintexture along with scars from years of drills, nails, staple guns, etc. wastransferred to soft, fibrous paper by rubbing it with water-solublewax crayons. This is a technique often used to recordimpressions of gravestones. Here, centuries of natural history evidenced by thepillar’s wood grain are joined with the trace marks of recent industry andhuman labor. Rubbings with earth tone pigments echo tree colors. The forms areclosely placed in a natural, organic arrangement mimicking the original grove.Each column is internally illuminated with a battery operated light fixture. Theinterior space suggests a natural forest yet presents a ghostly presentation ofpaper columns in an industrial venue.
This work was funded in part with a grant from theIowa Arts Council, a division of the Iowa Department of Cultural Affairs, andthe National Endowment of the Arts.
