Artwork

034_03_942-1005

034_03_942-1005

The largest global corporations have played one of the most significant roles in shaping the appearance and functionality of our world over the past several centuries. In the process, they have extracted extraordinary material wealth from the earth and transformed this material through the work of millions of employees into products and services.

034_03_932-941

034_03_932-941

The largest global corporations have played one of the most significant roles in shaping the appearance and functionality of our world over the past several centuries. In the process, they have extracted extraordinary material wealth from the earth and transformed this material through the work of millions of employees into products and services.

033_01_912-931

033_01_912-931

While building affordable housing on the West Side of Chicago, I came across this site of domestic objects that had been strewn across a vacant lot as if caught in a tornado. For me, the still life was poetic.

032_01_911

032_01_911

This work traces Madison St. from its origin in the east at Millennium Park to Pulaski Rd. in the west. Each print contains four photographs, two as if one was walking from west to east, and two as if one was walking from east to west. At a certain point, the perspective meet near The United Center, before continuing on their path moving to the east or the west.

031_03_900-910

031_03_900-910

This series draws upon a vast archive of images that trace a history of uprisings, protests, riots, massacres, and revolutions that are connected to race while also juxtaposing those images to images that trace Late Capitalism in America.

030_03_895-899

030_03_895-899

This series builds off of 027_03_732-751 by shifting the focus from fields of abstract geometric figures to the silhouettes of figures that can be associated with a particular object or the shape of the human body. Like the previous series, this field exists over a non-representational ground. In the process, a tension between the blurred field and a hard-lined field emerges.

029_01_792-894

029_01_792-894

029_02_787-791 and 029_01_792-894 are particularly personally significant for me. They offer a journey through the neighborhoods adjacent to the neighborhood of Hyde Park in which I grew up. These include Bronzeville, Washington Park, Englewood, and Woodlawn. When I grew up in Hyde Park in the late 1980s, these were neighborhoods that I was told were not to be entered because they dangerous. Today as I live on the Near West Side of Chicago, they remain neighborhoods that the news media reports as being very dangerous and plagued by significant gun violence. When one actually ventures into these areas, however, one finds less danger and more the traces of decades of disinvestment.

029_02_787-791

029_02_787-791

029_02_787-791 and 029_01_792-894 are particularly personally significant for me. They offer a journey through the neighborhoods adjacent to the neighborhood of Hyde Park in which I grew up. These include Bronzeville, Washington Park, Englewood, and Woodlawn. When I grew up in Hyde Park in the late 1980s, these were neighborhoods that I was told were not to be entered because they dangerous. Today as I live on the Near West Side of Chicago, they remain neighborhoods that the news media reports as being very dangerous and plagued by significant gun violence. When one actually ventures into these areas, however, one finds less danger and more the traces of decades of disinvestment.

028_02_752-786

028_02_752-786

Like many series, 028_02_752-786 began with found material. In this case, the material was a considerable amount of wallpaper that had been removed from a dining room that I was about to renovate. The gold silk wallpaper had an incredible quality that made it difficult for me to discard. As I contemplated what to do with the many sheets, I was inspired by the gold ground and inherent flatness of the surface to explore a series of icon paintings tied to traditional icons painting on gold surfaces. Instead, however, of choosing to create images, I favored an iconoclast approach that depicted the person via text.

027_03_732-751

027_03_732-751

This series of work reflects a turn away from events and histories, places and territories that exist in the world. In place of these subjects that have served as the focus of other works, I have chosen to explore the geometry and territory of the surface of the painting itself devoid of any external narrative. This has created an opportunity to focus strictly on what a painting can be as an autonomous entity through an explicit dialogue with the history of the medium.

026_02_732-775

026_02_732-775

These drawings and the poems that precede them arose from the thesis work for the MFA that I received from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2011. For quite some time, I did not include these poems and drawings in what I consider my body of work. This was largely a result of what I felt was an unsuccessful initial presentation alongside images and paintings that, in reality, were really part of a different line of thought.

026_08_731

026_08_731

The text is from the final the thesis of the MFA that I received from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2011. For quite some time, I did not include these poems and drawings in what I consider my body of work. This was largely a result of what I felt was an unsuccessful initial presentation alongside images and paintings that, in reality, were really part of a different line of thought.

026_08_730

026_08_730

The text is from the final the thesis of the MFA that I received from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2011. For quite some time, I did not include these poems and drawings in what I consider my body of work. This was largely a result of what I felt was an unsuccessful initial presentation alongside images and paintings that, in reality, were really part of a different line of thought.

025_03_726-729

025_03_726-729

The edge, center, surface, and field of the canvas are the concepts that drive the form of this series. Each is concerned with delimiting borders in a variety of manners and at different stages of the formation of the work. As this occurs, a space begins to form in which earth and sky take place as abstract colors and brush marks. Throughout, an attempt is made to both contain and break free from the limits of the canvas. This tension between elements offers a point of meditation that anchors the purpose of the work.

024_03_725

024_03_725

023 and 024 represent the first works executed strictly with paint in this catalogue of work – though 017 comes close, ultimately utilizing both plaster and ink. While others were executed both before and after, these exhibit a focus on geometry, territory, field, color, and event that dominate the more sustained focus on works – beginning with 025 in 2020 – created exclusively with paint and more concerned with the history, areas of focus, and future of that medium.

023_03_724

023_03_724

023 and 024 represent the first works executed strictly with paint in this catalogue of work – though 017 comes close, ultimately utilizing both plaster and ink. While others were executed both before and after, these exhibit a focus on geometry, territory, field, color, and event that dominate the more sustained focus on works – beginning with 025 in 2020 – created exclusively with paint and more concerned with the history, areas of focus, and future of that medium.

022_09_723

022_09_723

The initial intention was to write a screenplay that told the story of several generations and how they interacted with the landscape stretching between a cattle ranch in Texas and the Stockyards of Chicago. It was also concerned with the legacy of the Stockyards, Bertolt Brechts’ Joan of the Stockyards, and the story of Joan of Arc. While the screenplay was written, the more successful work exists in the found images used to illustrate this story and the open narrative they suggest rather than one fixed by my imagination.

021_09_722

021_09_722

The numerous vacant lots encountered while walking across the West Side of Chicago are striking. They bear witness to the destruction that occurred during ’68 Riots following the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and decades of under-investment. This series within the broader work brings together archival images of the neighborhood dating back to the late 19th C., photos of the assassination and riots, local activists such as the Vice Lords, local industry such as the former headquarters of Sears, contemporary images, process photos, and collages.

021_03_718-721

021_03_718-721

The numerous vacant lots encountered while walking across the West Side of Chicago are striking. They bear witness to the destruction that occurred during ’68 Riots following the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and decades of under-investment. This series within the broader work is created through tracing remnants of demolished buildings with energetic patterns, using these objects to create folds, and ultimately creating a new territory from the resulting geometry that traces the chaos of the event.

021_02_708-717

021_02_708-717

The numerous vacant lots encountered while walking across the West Side of Chicago are striking. They bear witness to the destruction that occurred during ’68 Riots following the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and decades of under-investment. This series within the broader work explores the surfaces of the buildings that might have been there through wallpaper, traces of textures, photographs, and empty forms created by a missing object.

020_04_702-707

020_04_702-707

This series falls in line with the broader interest in sites that are about to face a moment of transformation – in this case, from a vacant lot to the home of a new Nobu Hotel. The work the results uses material found on the site in combination with house paint and wood found on the site to create geometric patterns to create a compelling object catching light and raising questions in the receiver of its origin.

019_04_698-701

019_04_698-701

The boundary between painting and sculpture, the limits of the frame, the relationship between abstraction and representation, and the way that monumental manufacturing efforts that have vanished beneath sprawling strip malls are remembered drive the content of this work. It evolved from the photo series 010 to become these constructs.

018_04_695-697

018_04_695-697

While much of my work is connected to places that I have lived and physical locations I’ve investigated in depth, this series arose somewhat randomly when I purchased a volume of the newspaper Le Temps from the year 1880 from the University of Chicago Library. The work that resulted brought the death of Gustav Flaubert among other events to the surface while also providing an opportunity to draw on other materials themes running through my practice.

018_02_689-694

018_02_689-694

While much of my work is connected to places that I have lived and physical locations I’ve investigated in depth, this series arose somewhat randomly when I purchased a volume of the newspaper Le Temps from the year 1880 from the University of Chicago Library. The work that resulted brought the death of Gustav Flaubert among other events to the surface while also providing an opportunity to draw on other materials themes running through my practice.

017_03_680-688

017_03_680-688

The relationship between photography, painting, drawing, and sculpture is an underlying theme tying together my work. These paintings have their origin in photographs of I 90/94 – the major north-south highway in Chicago that divided and destroyed a number of neighborhoods when it was constructed. Through abstraction, the geometry of the roadway is highlighted and through the materiality of the paint, ink, and plaster the force of the road comes to life.

016_04_676-679

016_04_676-679

The transformation of the West Loop of Chicago from a meatpacking and produce district to a hub of restaurants, galleries, and artists lofts – and ultimately to a hub of global corporate offices – began with a series of restaurants and loft conversions in the mid-1990s. The glass out of which this work is crafter is from the first such restaurant – Marche. The materiel on the glass is gathered from the surrounding neighborhood.

015_09_670-675

015_09_670-675

For several years I ran a small office with a few other people devoted to exploring ways of attracting reinvestment in the West Side of Chicago. This effort involved developing what we called an “urban operating system” as well as kit of parts to rehabilitate the aging housing stock. This set of documents summarized our approach to redevelopment and how it might be scaled beyond Chicago.

015_01_578-669

015_01_578-669

For several years I ran a small office with a few other people devoted to exploring ways of attracting reinvestment in the West Side of Chicago. This effort involved developing what we called an “urban operating system” as well as kit of parts to rehabilitate the aging housing stock. This set of photographs, in particular, was used as site research for the proposals we developed to attract interest from investors.

014_09_577

014_09_577

A particular investigation of a place, history, or community often leads to artwork in a variety of media. In this case, photographs, sculptures, and this book. The format of a book was chosen to contain the narrative that grew out of my experience walking along the road and scrutinizing the photographs that resulted. The narrative ultimately is a utopia that images a new relationship to our built environment.

014_04_574-576

014_04_574-576

The area surrounding Western Avenue includes a number of vacant lots that are the result of a broad transformation of the area between the 1940s and the present. Crucial in this transformation was the 1968 Riots following the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. during which hundreds of buildings were set ablaze and later demolished. Objects found in these lots were combined to create a frame for the photographs of Western Ave.

014_01_437-573

014_01_437-573

Long roads running parallel create cross-sections of neighborhoods and communities, ways of building and decorating the landscape. Walking from one end to the other provides and opportunity to look at the people who are there and the materiality of the world they inhabit. It shows difference and continuity – a long history and idealized future – that can help us understand what is going on in the world.

013_01_394-436

013_01_394-436

What’s not there is often the most significant – the body that was there and that might come in the future, what one was thinking about and trying to do and the distraction that caused the turn of attention, and all the destinations pulling us through life. This work looks at the traces if this passing through the world – not, however, via the successes, but through the mistakes and signs of use.

012_01_363-393

012_01_363-393

As cities develop, there are often sites that are leftover from particular projects, buildings, and infrastructure. Perhaps they are made less desirable by these new investments. Perhaps they are difficult to build on because of what takes place below or above. Nevertheless, they often hold great beauty and potential for new encounters, programs, and events that might enrich the life of the city. This set of photographs looks at one such site above what is known as Hubbard Cave in Chicago.

011_01_341-362

011_01_341-362

The fortunate circumstances of some people as opposed to others call attention to the structure of wealth and the chance of our existence. So much of this chance is characterized by investment of energy by previous generations to transform their material circumstances. So often, this has required intense confrontation with the land – for many resulting is little wealth at all. This work explores that contrast.

010_01_289-340

010_01_289-340

Beyond a tradition of illustrating grand narratives, artwork should render the invisible, fleeting, overlooking, underappreciated, and undervalued so that we might have time and space for consideration and a new basis of knowledge. This work is concerned with sites around the city of Chicago that once produced the goods defining our world - in this case, the Western Electric’s Hawthorne Works that made a century of telephones among countless other objects.

009_01_214-288

009_01_214-288

Some places and things linger in one state for a prolonged period of time – perhaps decaying, in other case being meticulously cared for. At some point, however, a more profound change might occur that radically transforms the materiality or negates it entirely. These photographs explore both infrastructure that has been in place for decades and will likely endure as well as buildings about to experience a rebirth.

008_09_213

008_09_213

Artifacts that are personally relevant are quite distinct from those that are relevant to a wider range of people. Some objects, however, may hold extreme significance to an individual while also evoking a broader class of objects to which a number of people are attached. This work explores this tension between personal and universal through the practice of collage – both physical and with the aid of a camera.

008_04_199-212

008_04_199-212

Artifacts that are personally relevant are quite distinct from those that are relevant to a wider range of people. Some objects, however, may hold extreme significance to an individual while also evoking a broader class of objects to which a number of people are attached. This work explores this tension between personal and universal through the practice of collage – both physical and with the aid of a camera.

008_02_167-198

008_02_167-198

Artifacts that are personally relevant are quite distinct from those that are relevant to a wider range of people. Some objects, however, may hold extreme significance to an individual while also evoking a broader class of objects to which a number of people are attached. This work explores this tension between personal and universal through the practice of collage – both physical and with the aid of a camera.

007_02_158-166

007_02_158-166

Archives, slides containing specimens for examination, traces of past events, packaging, letters, envelopes, and sealing wax to ensure security are the dominant material of this work. They are combined on panels that once held an earlier painting, but that has since been erased. Together they form a composition that explores transparency, intimacy, and traces of life.

006_02_153-157

006_02_153-157

The process of creating 006_02_096-152 involved a variety of experiments – most of which did not become more formal works. These painted photographs, however, represent an important early use of painted geometry to highlight, form dialogue with, and reframe the content of a photograph. This process is evident in a significant amount of later work.

006_02_096-152

006_02_096-152

This work dwells in an empty building on the eve of its transformation from its initial use to a program suited to the evolving nature of the heart of the American City. Through examining and recording traces of the past, a field of reference is created that sparks the imagination. The mind connects these elements to the world beyond the walls. A new geography is formed.

005_09_095

005_09_095

The moving image works 005_05_082-094 led to a series of exemplary stills that were indicative of the major themes explored. This limited edition book is intended to highlight the juxtapositions that occur within the moving images works while giving the receiver time to reflect on them with added time and enhanced capacity to explore the totality of the set.

005_05_082-094

005_05_082-094

The era of global mobility has made it possible to connect disparate locales with increasing ease. The global north is compressed into an increasingly homogenous zone of wealthy consumers while the south house cheap labor in factories. This relationship was inaugurated in the colonial era as chattel slavery returned. The Caribbean Islands and North American Cities played a significant role. This work explores that history and its legacy today.

004_02_061-081

004_02_061-081

People pass through places like Union Station in Chicago and other cities around the world every day without pausing to look at the truly remarkable building, seeing each other and all the artifacts making the moment. Through photography and geometry framing, hiding, and combing, time is arrested and an encounter held for examination.

003_02_050-060

003_02_050-060

The consequences of enslavement are inscribed in the landscape. Land is controlled and people are brought under the influence of charismatic leaders. The lines that I draw can, however, protest past decisions leading to atrocities and give birth to a new territory.

002_08_042-049

002_08_042-049

The time spent researching the context in which each treaty signing occurred – the broader effect this event had on the world, the symbolic and real nature, the other events occurring the make it relevant – is distilled in text that opens that vast space at which this work stands at the edge.

002_04_034-041

002_04_034-041

Salvaged wood lath covered in plaster become an object that evokes a particular history of construction. Taken outside of its context and idealized, it assumes emptiness that is contrasted with the depth of the images used to create collages next to which they are intended to be viewed.

002_02_026-033

002_02_026-033

The line between past and future, one side and the other, two opponents, perhaps future allies, provide the context for this work. The rooms in which these meetings occur, the focus.

001_02_001-025

001_02_001-025

Those who inhabit this moment make the future via the present materials. This formation will be guided by negotiating the difference between what we think of as the world and how we see the horizon before us as an individual.

About the Artwork