Author Archives: Doug

Art, Technology

Suffocation #2

2024
15″ x 16″ x 3.5″
Bronze, driftwood

The second in a series that touches on the conflict between nature and technology as the technology that dominates our everyday lives suffocates, distorts, and intrudes upon our relationship with the natural world.

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Art, Technology

Suffocation #1

2024
14″ x 14″ x 6″
Bronze, stone

This piece touches on the conflict between nature and technology as the technology that dominates our everyday lives suffocates, distorts, and intrudes upon our relationship with the natural world.

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Art, Maps and Data

Melting Point #1

2024
9″ x 5″ x 6″
Bronze

This sculpture is based on the data from the National Climate Assessment that predicts which areas of the United States are forecasted to have the greatest change in the number of extreme heat days by the end of the 21st century. Those areas are literally melting off this map. The bronze was created by making a wax map of the United States and melting the areas of Texas through Florida with a blowtorch, then casting the melted wax as bronze.

The source data:

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Art, Random

Mother and Child

2024
7″ x 5″ x 9″
Bronze

This is a special piece for me because it’s a collaboration between me and my mom.

My mom was an artist. She passed away when I was a teenager so I never really got to collaborate with her on anything. After she died we were clearing out her studio and I found this small little clay sculpture sitting on her windowsill.

It was a little thing you can hold in the palm of your hand. A mother holding a child. It instantly became one of my most prized possessions. I kept it with me from that day on. I brought it to college, kept it through multiple moves, and now that I have my own studio space it sits on my windowsill, as it sat on hers. If my house was burning down, this is one of first the things I’d save.

Fast forward 25 years. I decided it was time to revisit this little sculpture. I 3D scanned it and then printed it larger. I made a mold, cast it in wax, and then used the lost wax method to pour it in bronze. Polishing bronze to a mirror finish can make it shine brilliantly. Before this piece I never had the patience. For the last week I’ve been polishing. Four hours a day, day after day. Normally I’d get tired or bored or lose interest. Not this time. Because this one is for my mom and you can be damn sure I was going to make it shine.

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