WHO AM I?
CURATED
WORK
"The artist, however faithful to [their] personal vision of reality, becomes the last champion of the individual mind and sensibility against an intrusive society and an officious state."
- Ursula K. Le Guin
3D WORK
Re-Inhabitants
Re-Inhabitant No.1, 2024
Oil-Based Clay & Cast Iron RadiatorRe-Inhabitant No.2, 2024
Hoses, Rubber Dip & Cast Iron RadiatorParasitism involves one organism exploiting another to the detriment of the host. The parasitic flatworm Leucochloridium Paradoxum invades the eyestalks of snails, taking control of their behavior and pushing the snail to climb to a location where it is most visible predatory birds. It causes the eyestalks to swell and pulsate, mimicking the appearance of caterpillars to attract birds, which subsequently eat the snail. This manipulation ensures the parasite’s reproductive cycle is completed, as the bird becomes the host of its eggs upon eating the infected snail.
The parasitic isopod Cymothoa Exigua, replaces a fish's tongue by attaching itself to the tongue’s base after severing its blood supply, causing the original organ to atrophy and fall off. The isopod then securely positions itself as a replacement, mimicking the tongue’s form and function. It remains in place, allowing the fish to use it as a functional tongue to grasp and manipulate food. This behavior ensures the isopod’s survival, as it feeds on the fish’s blood and mucus.
In Re-Inhabitant No.2, I correlate the tendril-like structures that make up the “life form” with parasites, infiltrating and reanimating the cast iron radiator debris. It is unclear whether the creature came into possession of the radiator in this state, or this is the result of the titular Re-Inhabitant coming into contact with an intact one. Tar-like ichor that spill from the orifices of the radiator hint at the presence of some contamination or corruption taking place in the interaction of the lifeform with its newform shell.
I am choosing to define reinhabitation as the repurposing of a shell or structure by a biologically unrelated lifeform. The hermit crab repurposes discarded shells as homes, adapting to protect its soft abdomen. When outgrowing a shell, it searches for a replacement, occasionally participating in shell exchanges where crabs sequentially trade, rotating communally into more spacious homes.Birds like the osprey nest in abandoned structures, using available materials to create safe environments for their offspring. Ospreys often adapt to human-made structures like utility poles or disused platforms. This behavior is in a way reverse biomimicry, where animals utilize and adapt to the remnants of human design for their survival. Unlike traditional biomimicry, where humans replicate nature, reverse biomimicry showcases how wildlife adapts to the anthropogenic era and are forced to navigate and exploit unintended habitats.Shipping container homes are often compared to the hermit crab's use of shells for shelter due to their nature as hard structures repurposed into living space. However, while they offer a level of modularity that makes for an extraordinarily effective sales pitch, shipping container homes are neither particularly comfortable nor as environmentally friendly as they are made out to seem. The metal containers require extensive insulation and retrofitting to become livable, often making them less sustainable than homes built from renewable, locally-sourced materials like wood or adobe. Unlike natural materials, shipping containers require energy-intensive climate control to be comfortable, and their production and transportation have significant environmental costs. The final nail in their coffin is the wide array of toxic chemicals that can build up on the linings of containers that have seen use, meaning most container homes are constructed from brand new containers.
The radiator as both form and symbol is explored in my two-part series, commenting on the state of the american dream of industrialization and it’s corrosion on not just the human way of life, but that of life as a whole.
The Deepwater Horizon spill, widely agreed to be one of the most devastating ecological disasters in history, occurred in 2010 when an offshore oil drilling rig, operated by BP, experienced a catastrophic blowout. The blowout was caused by a failure in the well's cement casing, designed to seal the well and prevent gas from escaping. This failure, compounded by inadequate safety protocols and faulty equipment, allowed natural gas to surge to the surface, igniting an explosion that killed 11 workers and caused the rig to sink. The damaged wellhead continued to spew oil into the Gulf of Mexico for 87 days, releasing over 4 million barrels of crude oil into marine ecosystems. In the present day, the active and uninhibited extraction of tar sands in Alberta, Canada, involves strip mining vast areas of forest to access bitumen, leaving behind barren landscapes and polluted water systems. Biomimetic technologies have emerged as innovative solutions to address these spills and pollutants. For example, oil-absorbing materials inspired by the superhydrophobic properties of lotus leaves are used to create advanced sponges and membranes that efficiently separate oil from water. Oyster Mushrooms, which can break down hydrocarbons in contaminated soils through a process called mycoremediation, effectively reduce toxic residues. Similarly, bioengineers have developed microbial consortia capable of degrading pollutants in oil spills and industrial waste, mimicking natural processes found in ecosystems.
My pieces are pulled from a state of apocalyptic hyperreality, where some life has adapted to repurpose and hide within the detritus of the collapse of industrial civilization as we know it, while others actively exploit its state of decline, thriving in extraction and contamination.
Reinhabitant No. 2 consists of two similarly rusted remnants: a pipe connection and a leg. Rubber hoses spew from the orifices, writhing and interconnecting the fragments. These hoses support the foot piece, reanimating the broken form. Black rubber viscera pours from grotesque moments of intersection, dripping and pooling across the surface of the form. This reanimation of the radiator’s broken form parallels the parasitic relationship between the billionaire class and the working class, where the tools of resource extraction exploit labor and the environment for profit. The cast iron radiator, a relic of domestic stability and the American Dream, becomes an unsettling symbol of how these ideals are eroded by relentless consumption and inequality. The once-solid structures of comfort and security are degraded and repurposed into mechanisms of exploitation and decay. This piece challenges the viewer to confront the macrocosmic realities of a world where extraction and exploitation dominate, leaving both the physical and ideological remnants of past eras hollowed out and transformed into tools of domination.