My knee jerk reaction to the theme “Root System” was teeth. My newly minted teenager recently had two baby teeth pulled to make room for a palate expander (precursor to braces) to hopefully improve the function of her teeth and jaw. I couldn’t help but think about the intrusive nature of the dentist removing parts of my daughter’s body, parts that I helped grow in utero, and how these procedures are quite literally changing the future of her body and how it will function for the rest of her life (thankfully for the positive). Even as her mother, do I really know better than nature? Alterations of the natural world can have long-lasting effects, both positive and negative, that ripple through ecosystems for generations. Parallels can be made across environmental degradation versus the fight for preservation of wild land to the landscape of my daughter’s mouth.
The images below are pieces are from my little collection in the studio.
I tend to think very literally at first with a new project: large scale teeth sculptures poking out of the plants on the trail. The image of stark white monoliths poking out from (aka Stone Henge) the lush and wild summer greenery has been on my mind a lot. I enjoy the shape of a molar in general, with its roots, so I have room to push my play further with this beyond the obvious recognizable symbol. As an object it feels like a little house on stilts, much like Baba Yaga’s mobile bird-legged cottage.
I began making models to help visualize what these sculptures could look like. Here are some samples.
