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:
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.
2023
4″ x 3″ x 5″
Bronze
Kneeling down before the phone god.
2023
5″ x 2″ x 4″
Bronze
A series of 5 small bronze castings of the Tree of Knowledge sculpture.
2023
12″ x 15″ x 19″
Driftwood, resin
I was inspired (horrified?) by seeing so many people out in nature doing nothing but posing for selfies for social media. If humans can look so ridiculous out in nature, maybe nature should too?
The driftwood was found on the beach at Pajaro Dunes, south of Santa Cruz, CA. Photos below are taken at the same beach.
2023
11″ x 7″ x 10″
Bronze
This self portrait was generated by using a 3D scanner to scan my face, illustrating how the technology imperfectly sees me. The result is full of artifacts. Pieces of skin floating above my face, deranged features, soulless eyes. This is how the machines see us.
The 3D scan that the scanner produced is shown below in all its disturbing glory:
And here are a few other scans for your nightmares:
2023
Resin
19″ x 12″ x 18″
It’s a selfie arm taking a selfie of a selfie arm taking a selfie of a selfie arm…
2023
Resin
14″ x 12″ x 12″
Iron, bronze, 2022
This iron and bronze sculpture maps the movement of the Camp Fire that destroyed the town of Paradise, California in November 2018. It’s a map of the fire perimeter, with the majority of the sculpture in rusted iron. The boundary of the town of Paradise is in polished bronze inlaid into the larger sculpture.
The height of the sculpture represents the time at which that area burned. The lowest parts represent where the fire started. You can trace the movement of the fire by following the sculpture from the low areas to the higher areas. The Camp Fire started near the middle of the fire footprint, just east of the town of Paradise, CA.
The Camp Fire began November 8, 2018 and was fully contained on November 25, 2018. 85 people lost their lives. It destroyed over 18,000 structures, many of them in the town of Paradise, CA. This sculpture highlights the town of Paradise, however, it’s important to note that other towns, such as Concow, Magalia, and Butte Creek Canyon were also largely destroyed. It is the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California’s history.
The source data was downloaded from NASA FIRMS (Fire Information for Resource Management System). The dataset consists of points with timestamps indicating when burn activity was detected.
You can watch an animation of the fire progression to get a sense of how the fire spread and what the sculpture represents:
Or here’s another animated map of the same data, color coding the burned areas by day:
I wrote code that converted that raw point data into a 3D model. That model was 3D printed, then I made a mold of the printed sculpture and cast it to wax. Then I used the lost wax casting method to create the iron sculpture and the separate bronze section. Metal casting was done at the Crucible in Oakland, CA.
Concrete, plywood, enamel, and paint, 2017
Much of the rhetoric around immigration to the U.S. in recent years has centered on the Trump administration’s proposal to build a wall along the southern border. The effects of this debate on immigrant cities that are far from such physical borders is less visible, but in New York City, whose airports offer the first port of entry for many immigrants, the impacts of immigration policy are no less meaningful. In this sculpture, data artist Doug McCune physicalizes the barriers that many would-be immigrants face: a combination of restrictive policies, anti-immigrant sentiment, and economic realities.
The work shows a concrete wall surrounding New York City. The height of each section is proportional to the number of immigrants living in New York who originally came from the various directions on the globe. The routes were mapped as an airplane would fly from each region of New York City to the country of origin. McCune determined the height by calculating the number of immigrants “crossing” each section of the city border. This piece challenges us to ask: what would New York be without immigrants? How close will we get to finding out?
Source: The map uses data on country of origin for all foreign-born residents from the 2017 American Community Survey five-year estimates.
This work was commissioned for the You Are Here NYC exhibit at the Pratt Manhattan Gallery, Sep – Nov, 2017.
