Artist Statement

I am a mixed media sculptor and I create interactive art installations.  One of my primary goals is to make art more approachable and fun for a general audience.  This basic goal motivates me to work in sculptural mediums because I can create art with materials that people recognize.  This familiarity makes the art more welcoming and encourages viewers to learn more and interact with my projects.  Materials that I tend to use include metal, wood, glass, acrylic, lighting, and motors.  I am interested in the intersection of art and industry.  Where processes of material handling depart from simple utilitarianism into precious and interesting objects.

I have an upfront aesthetic combined with a deep affection for the 20th century avant-garde.  Within straightforward lines and simple applications of physics, my works subvert what is to be expected.  I believe a piece is most successful when it has layers of meaning, when something that appears so unassuming and personal transitions into something universal.  I accomplish this by using simple shapes like spheres, triangles, and parallel lines and arranging these forms to function as metaphors. 

Through the use of movement, time, and technology my works are able to make gestures.  Spheres can roll and interact with each other.  Fabric can lay flat or rise with gusts of wind.  Bristles of a brush can flick and move with emotion.  When a single work of transforms shape, it offers dynamic changes that we are used to noticing in a song.  When a band plays very quiet to attract close attention and then builds up the volume into a powerful frenzy.  My goal is that my kinetic sculptures evoke a similar visceral emotion through moments of both rest and stimulus.