Mathematics as a window into the art of design and form

Abstract

I want to inspire in the viewer of my work a sense of wonder and awe of the natural world, as well as an appreciation of the mathematical structure of shapes and designs that are found in the world that surrounds us all. A common human experience is a simple act of picking up a stick from the ground – peeling the bark off with our fingernails and touching the smooth softwood underneath. My work taps into that same primal desire of touching nature and being close to it as well as appreciating the simple mathematical elegance of patterns and relationships that exist within nature. Trees connect us back to nature, back to this Earth. When walking in the forests surrounding my home, I am constantly picking up sticks of different sizes and lengths. My material surrounds me daily and how extraordinary is it to find something so ubiquitous and be able to create art from that. To craft my work, I usually begin with a drawing. This sketch acts like a road map for what I want my work to look like. That sketch always takes into account not only the structural form and line of the proposed sculpture but also numbers and fractions of each transition and segment that are built into the wooden sculpture. My work is not steam bent. Over many decades I have created a unique technique of working with wood – my primary material. I start out each day collecting tree limbs and sticks that have fallen to the ground. Next, I debark the branch and look for shapes found within each piece of wood. I then cut and permanently join these small shapes together using dowels and wood glue. Then, all the open joints get filled with a homemade putty and sanded. This process of putty and sanding usually needs to be repeated at least three times. It is a very time-consuming process and each sculpture takes me a minimum of a month to build. The sculpture that is being constructed appears like my line drawing but in space. I am interested in having my work appears as if it organically grew in nature, when in fact each sculpture is frequently composed of over 100 small pieces of wood that are seamlessly joined together. My influences are many – from looking at the patterns in nature and plant life on this Earth to researching the heavenly bodies in the images beamed back from the Hubble Telescope – from studying ancient Buddhist mandalas and sacred geometry throughout the ages to delving into quantum physics and string theory. All these influences inspire me daily.