A non-human community project which includes works on paper, free standing sculptures and audio components.

Project Statement

Each summer in my home state of Montana -and across much of the western U.S. and into Canada- the threat of wild land fires looms large. In the spring of 2021, while hiking in a burned forest near my home in Greenough, Montana, I was struck by the contrasting states of devastation and renewal. The landscape felt both fragile and strangely beautiful. The fire had occurred in 2017, leaving most of the lodgepole pine, western larch and ponderosa pine trees killed. The black trees stood in stark contrast to the young seedlings of ponderosa pine, western larch, and whitebark pine seedlings that the National Forest Foundation had planted since the fire. Fireweed, arnica, lupine and scarlet paintbrush were some of the plants that had returned and color dotted the landscape.

The charred remains of trees in forests devastated by extreme wildfires due to our rapidly changing climate serve as the conceptual and material foundation for The Standing Dead. Through my artworks, I seek to capture their presence in death and honor their existence, while examining the broader ecological and existential narratives they embody. This portrait series serves as both a lament and gesture of atonement for these once-living indispensable members of our forest.