Artist Statement

I want solutions that demand a problem. Implications without entailment. Rules of transmutation out of chance phenomenon; rules from something given which echoes its presence. Neither intrusion from without nor discovery of physical laws within, but a play on the effects of things transformed to reach a transformed experience.

About the Yupo Sculptures

These sculptures are all derived from a single piece of paper crumpled, then laid flat again. The lines were traced, brought into Google Sketchup, and portions of the crumple were extracted and augmented into 3D shapes. It seems that a very large number of outcomes can come from this single sheet, and it is my aim to discover what types of things are in there. I enjoy is the process of discovery and surprise, which I hope will project to the final pieces. The main transformations include making sure the object can cohere in the world and not collapse, and making decisions about whether to leave a part out or not, and playing with those implications. But what’s ultimately out here was in there. I’m not so interested in experimenting with what a single sheet of paper can do when folded in elaborate ways so much as I am into seeing what shapes can occur from some phenomenon (i.e. random crumpling.) I use as many sheets in construction as needed, though they are limited in size to provide an additional transformative filter, forcing me to alter the size and construction in interesting ways. The use of Yupo (polypropelene alternative paper) is practical and aesthetic; Practical because it has flexibility, strength, environmental stability and is very accessible to me to both obtain and work with; Aesthetic in that it inherently emphasizes form over mass, and idea over gesture because of its lightness, crispness and fragility of impression. I could easily see these done in another medium besides paper, or paper-like substances, but this strongly suggested itself. As I work in other scales, for instance, the materials could change. The expressive and suggestive aspects of the work emerge from the phenomenon of the original source and in the evidences and traces of making. The overall effect of each piece varies with the guiding choices of scale, exclusion, complexity, and structure. It is a constant process of choosing, winnowing, and editing, being directed by the given and letting the parts interact in ways they dictate.

About the Wood Sculptures

The parts for the wood sculptures were derived from images that were linked together by common geometrical features. For instance, I may combine several pictures of a cloud of smoke from a fire or an explosion, or perhaps some piece of machinery. I cut the panels to coincide with the angles formed by the picture planes. The final solution consists of both a positive and a negative. The positive part is an arrangement that derives from the inner part of the plane, while the negative solution derives from the “discarded” parts left over. I feel they bear stamps of their respective source or subject materials and the process of their making.