Date of Submission

Spring 2021

Academic Program

Studio Arts

Project Advisor 1

Ellen Driscoll

Abstract/Artist's Statement

A thread is made up of filaments, twisting together, entangled within and upon one another. Threads swirl in collaboration, forming a connection larger than themselves. They tie together larger things, gripping and holding. A thread on a screw catches on to pieces of wood or thick substances to bind a large structure into a whole. A thread can describe a small stream, a body of water that is small and wiggly. Threads move on, persuaded by gravity, to form larger beings by lumping together with other threads to merge into a body of water.

It is often believed that there is a separation between the human and natural, working as independent systems without interference. But, as we create and build, our inventions end up tangled with the natural world. Buildings, roads, chemicals, noise, and light creep over the earth's surface. Human and nature's growth continue to cross over, weaving together. Both systems are fighting for space and survival.

This world that I have built—the organic skeletons, decaying buckets, orange lines—imagines this struggle between human and nature. Suspended above a rusty and crystallized landscape, the sapling structures are dependent on artificial support systems to keep them in existence. If they fell, they would tumble into a pile of bones, becoming remains. The buckets rely on the structures to give them purpose, acting as counterweights and recirculating systems. The buckets each are workers, laboring over different tasks. Over time, the rust and salt crystallization marks time passing. Each day, new decay forms as buckets move and splash, progressing towards entanglement. They mark the space with their decay.

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