Artist Books

Consilience: A Sensory Map of the Natural World is my homage to the very essence of a natural place through memory and object, and my invitation to others to treasure, protect and preserve such natural places.

The work is an installation environment where the viewer becomes a participant in the creation: an old box of collected natural ephemera and a field guide of altered text and image embody the excitement of discovery and the draw of nostalgia that occur when a physical place is held close to one’s heart. Set upon an old table, the work peels back the layers of, and examines the ties between, memory and landscape. Using a small lake in the Eastern Sierra and my memories of summers spent there as a lens to focus the exploration, I hope to give viewers a full sensory experience of the place, but also to awaken personal recollections of natural places that have figured prominently in their memories and lives. By evoking these memories, I hope to inspire viewers to return to those places, or to seek new ones, in order revel in the true wonder and beauty of the natural world.

You can read the complete artist statement here.

size
box closed  17” wide x 8.5” deep x 12 tall
box opened 17” wide x 18” deep x 19” tall 
book closed 6.5” x 6”
book opened 19”-13’ x 6” (extended dimensions depend on how far inner accordion is pulled out, but book can be read without pulling the inner accordion out)

structure/binding
found box with custom glass ledge and tunnel book structure in lid; custom, hand-bound leather book

materials
found box containing items from nature, terrarium, handmade paper and letterpress printing; custom-bound leather field guide with handmade paper, letterpress printing, and altered, handwritten and hand-rendered text and image

edition: 1

This book is held in the following collection:

Pennsylvania State University, Special Collections/Rare Books & Manuscripts