I repurpose manufactured materials to create and photograph site-responsive installations in unbuilt landscapes.
Rooted in the tension between nature and artificiality, the installations pose questions about how we interact with the environment, and how we might find equilibrium with it. In recent years I’ve found fabric to be the perfect medium through which to explore these themes. On the one hand it is a processed/manufactured material. Woven, dyed and stitched, it carries all the baggage of our consumption-based culture. Yet as human-made materials go, fabric fits right in with nature. It is flexible, soft and deeply responsive to wind, light and other natural forces. Exposed to the elements as an installation in a natural setting, it performs a visual negotiation not only between the artificial and the natural, but between intention and chance, stillness and movement, disruption and collaboration. Before my current focus on textiles, I made installations from a variety of manufactured cultural items including plastic cups and plates, take-out containers, hula hoops, cheese balls, straws and post-it notes. Mimicking natural phenomena like bird murmurations, insect swarms, super blooms and wildfires, these installations are studies in contradiction. They adapt to their surroundings, appearing almost to belong, yet their mere presence as mass-produced, single use objects is an affront to the landscapes they inhabit. In this state of simultaneous harmony and conflict, the installations mirror our own uneasy, imbalanced relationship with the environment. All of my photographs strain credulity by design. At first blush they can appear to be digital fabrications, but in truth, they are entirely in-camera, printed with minimal post-production. At a moment when AI-generated imagery is rapidly reshaping visual culture—and making the line between the real and the fabricated ever blurrier—these works offer a quiet counterpoint. They are both meditations on illusion and assertions of the tangible. My installations ask viewers to question their eyes, but also to appreciate the labor and unpredictability behind each image. They’re a reminder that reality can still surprise us.