Preservation

This series of work is a reflection on my relationship with material. These logs were all cut from a pine tree that was blown over in a storm where I live. It had been decaying on the forest floor before I intervened in its decomposition by performing acts of preservation found in certain building techniques, lumber treatment and cord wood storage. What remains from these gestures of burning, wrapping, drying, and concealing are artifacts of my interactions with the wood and a study on how to work alongside the will of the material.

The logs themselves, while largely remaining in their natural form, display markings that signal a relationship between myself and the material. You can see swirls and folds where I had wrapped, cured and then removed large sheets of fabric and plaster. You can see cracks and fissures where the wood started to split as a result of the drying process. And most notably you can see the charred surface of the wood where I was invoking the Japanese preservation technique - yakisugi.

The sculptural pieces that accompany the charred logs show how my actions do not stand alone in my practice. The first plaster piece that sits in the corner of the room is made up of a pile of plaster sheets that were previously wrapping and covering the logs. This piece was made up of all the fabric that didn’t bear any markings of the wood that can be seen in several of the other plaster pieces that line the walls of the space. This piece is stacked haphazardly, slumped over creating a sort of shameful, lazy figure as it faces away from the center of the room. Opposite this piece stands a hollow, rigid shell pulled from one of the burnt logs. The inside shows the charred wood grain that the plaster pulled from the surface of the log as it sat in my studio for several months. This piece, unlike its counterpart, faces outward revealing its hollow interior signaling my dependence on material as it admits how my physical actions cannot stand on their own.

wood, plaster, fire, fabric. (2021)