Sonar, 2012, (4:00 Clip) TRT: 11:17, Filmed in Waldo Canyon, CO
Edge Effects (Installation View), 2015, Cafritz Art Center, Montgomery College, MD
Traditional Curvilinear Convention, 2015, soot on paper, charred wood and bolts, Drawing: 60 X 108 Inches.
Traditional Curvilinear Convention (detail), 2015.
Untitled, 2015, Cotton sleeves, soot, framed photographs, dimensions variable.
Untitled (detail), 2015, inkjet prints on archival mat, 12 X 40 Inches.
Edge Effects
Cafritz Art Center
Montgomery College, MD
This is a two-person exhibition with artist Leah Raintree
WILDLAND HUMAN INTERFACE (W.H.I) refers to border areas where undeveloped land runs into (sub)urban sprawl. The terms was coined by the National Fire Plan in 2000, which specifically recognizes this border area as problematic in light of the massive increase of development throughout North America until the economic crash of 2008. This project is about a W.H.I located in Colorado Springs, CO, which erupted in a series of five major wildfires in the summer of 2012. I was in CO working with my small community in the Huerfano Valley on digging out a spring to improve on a newly extended waterline in a rural section of the Sangre de Cristo mountain range. I visited the site of the Colorado Springs fires a day after most of the flames were extinguished. I was amazed to find flowering Shrub Oaks sprouting out of the ash- when you looked away from the decimated houses, the fire was a positive force within a long standing ecological system.
SONAR is a single channel video that was filmed during the first and only exploration of the site. The voice over narrative is extracted from two interviews I did with the Linda Fleming and Mary Anne Flood, two incredible woman who have lived in the Huerfano Valley for many decades and have an intimate relation to the particular landscape of the high desert. Audio soundtrack and voice over was done by Luz Fleming. The other pieces in the project were created after the video, and are in response to historical research I did concerning suburban plans specifically related to the cul-de-sac, the relation between the decorative designs of William Morris' hexagonal floral patterns and suburban schematics, and disaster response and cleanup programs in the U.S.