Extinction
Over the last few years I have become increasingly concerned about the climate crisis, the loss of so many of the plants and animals with whom we share this planet, and the looming possibility of human extinction.
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During 2022 I actualized these concerns in the form of an installation, which was premiered at Dia De Los Muertos (Day Of The Dead) at SomArts Cultural Center, in San Francisco, California.
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Although Dia De Los Muertos is traditionally a celebration of love and appreciation of the ancestors, I took the opportunity to look to the future, to those for whom we will be the ancestors. How can we fulfill our obligations to our descendants?
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The installation consists of 100 hand made and glazed ceramic coffins, each one filled with items of our life on earth, from cotton to asphalt, black beans to bullets, plastic water bottles, locks and keys, cars, ashes, dredlocks, oak leaves and more. The viewer is invited to take in just how much we have to lose, and to be moved by that realization to create change. The installation also contains a series of collages which include suggestions for action.
Although this installation had its first appearance as part of the Dia De Los Muertos exhibition, it can also be seen as an meditation on Earth in the Time of Hospice, or a fantasy of what extraterrestrial archeologists might uncover in a future time, to ponder the fate of our species, our time.