Field Notes
I return to lichens often.
Not because they are beautiful.
Because they quietly reorganize the places where they live.
Nothing happens quickly.
One piece becomes ten.
One petal becomes thousands.
The sculpture isn't built all at once.
It accumulates.
Light changes the sculptures as much as the sculptures change the light.
The color shifts throughout the day.
Edges disappear.
Shadows become part of the form.
In quiet rooms, they soften echoes.
If you lean into the center, the layered petals gather distant sounds much like a seashell.
These weren't qualities I set out to engineer.
They emerged through making.
I've learned to pay attention when materials begin teaching me something I didn't expect.
2018–ongoing
Lichen
Silk, cotton, wood, steel
Dimensions variable
2018–ongoing
The Lichen series consists of hand-built sculptural forms assembled one silk petal at a time. Thousands of individual components accumulate into dense surfaces that reference the colors, structures, and quiet complexity of lichens.
Rather than depicting specific species, each sculpture considers lichen as a model for collaboration, accumulation, and ecological transformation. Like the organisms that inspire them, the works grow through repetition, where countless small actions gradually become environments of their own.
