Portfolio > Offerings

These intimate outdoor works exists at the intersection of art, biology, imagination and response to site. Made during a residency at Mountain Lake Biological Station, they were inspired by an informative walk led by esteemed mycologist, Rytas Vilgalys, during the height of mushroom season. The small art works are ephemeral pieces meant to echo the scale and brief fruiting period of many mushroom species. It is postulated that fungi act as a “Wood Wide Web”, connecting many trees through their underground network of rhizomes. Similarly, the repeated pod and fruit forms connect the viewers experience as they move through the woods. Whereas the role of the scientist is to collect, identify and categorize the various types of flora and fauna, my role in this body of work was to present an offering back to the forest, and in so doing bring awareness to what the forest offers us, and prompt the viewer to perceive the forest in a new way.

Oculus
Plaster, pigment installed in tree
10 x 12 x 10" approx
2016
Ode to Rytas
Wood, pigment installed on mossy log
2 x 20 x 6"
2016
Little Wing
Wood, pigment, mushrooms on moss
3 x 8 x 6" approx
2016
Pods in Mossy Stump
Plaster, pigment installed in mossy stump
24 x 30 x 48" approx
2016
Cavity
Wood, pigment installed in stump
5 x 8 x 8" approx
2016
Offering i
Plaster, dye, pigment, on stump
14 x 10 x 8" approx
2016
Offering ii
Wood, plaster, pigment, dye on moss bed
6 x 36 x 24" approx
2016
Offering ii Detail
Wood, pigment installed on moss bed
2 x 9 x 3" approx
2016
Salamander Stump
Plaster, dye, lichen on stump
20 x 18 x 18" approx
2016
Castle
Wood, pigment installed in decaying stump
16 x 10 x 9" approx
2016
Oak Burl
Plaster, dye, pigment installed under Oak Tree
5 ft diameter approx.
2016