IMAGES | STATEMENT | RESUME

The Atomic exhibition includes sculptures and photographic imagery largely inspired by the events of the atomic age, during which over 1000 atomic bomb tests were conducted on land, at sea and in the atmosphere. In this relatively short historical period between 1945 and 1960, the most significant of scientific achievements arrived with lasting and largely unmanageable consequences.

Connections between Atomic sculptures and the atomic age are fairly subtle and indirect, drawn from personal reflections on my research. Some sculptures were simply inspired from the name, place or background story of a particular atomic test. Others, such as the atom in Atomic #1, are drawn from the iconic beauty and potential of the smallest of atomic particles. The Atomic sculptures were created as a personal response to my own deeper questions about humanity; on certainty and fallibility.

The Atomic sculptures are kinetic, and each draws its energy from sunlight using a small array of solar cells. A sculpture entitled Heart is made of bits of broken and melted glass and activated by its own internal pump. The remaining sculptures in the Atomic series employ polarizing technology pioneered during the atomic age, used here to modulate light transmission. All sculptures are constructed in vintage wooden explosives boxes from the 1940's and 1950's.

The Atomic photographs are a series of Polaroid emulsion lifts, presented in this exhibition as a triptych. The three sets are entitled Atomic / Red, Atomic / Blue and The Greening of Fort Andrews. A Polaroid emulsion lift is a fragile layer of film that is removed from an original photograph and, in this series, draped onto paper. The emulsion's onion skin-thin surface was selected as a medium because it could serve as a delicate host for the most powerful of atomic images.

Atomic / Red is a series of sixteen emulsions transferred from film and video of actual atomic tests conducted between 1945 and 1960. Atomic / Blue is a series of sixteen emulsions transferred from film and video of actual atomic tests and the artificial structures and environments that were impacted by the bomb tests. The Greening of Fort Andrews is a series of sixteen original, present-day photographs of the former military encampment on Peddocks Island in Boston Harbor. Today, at Fort Andrews, a primeval forest is flourishing among the remains of a former military base. The frames in the Atomic Polaroid series were handmade from hardwoods found drifting ashore on the Boston Harbor Islands.