I like maps. They are BIG picture — and they take me out of my microscopic myopia. Also, they have wonderful meandering lines.

In my work, I like to think about natural processes that happen over time, like evolution, decay, and biotic/abiotic relationships. Now I’m interested in rooting those processes in a specific place. So I’m exploring Mapping Change as a theme.

“Place” is not a fixed thing. For example, I’m inspired by Harold Fisk’s maps of the historical traces of the Mississippi River (like the one above), produced as part of a report to the US Army Corps of Engineers in the 1940s. Rivers change all the time. Coastlines do too, and with climate change upon us, they change now more than ever.

Every place is an event — a . . . v e r y . . . s l o w . . . e v e n t.

Here are some works in progress exploring some incipient ideas with maps. They are in their early stages and they are going to get some other elements layered in, but I don’t know what yet. The work tells me what it needs next…

Working by hand helps me feel as if I am marking the time it takes to traverse the river or coastline. I like to work with used linens as a substrate because they help me think about human history, not just natural history. Above is a map of a section of the South Toe River, not far from where I live.
The map above is of the Mississippi headwaters. I have stepped over that awesome river at its humble source, where it’s nothing more than a shallow creek.