It was not the details that were important at that moment, but the radiance of light and shadows, brightness and darkness, height and width, whiteness and vaulting, the view and the air.
- Wolf Prix on The Open House
With just the right amount of light casting shadows through a colonnade of diagonal bracing, even a house built of timber can stand with the flying buttresses of Notre Dame, if only for a brief moment.
The Orders of Homewood
An order in architecture is a certain assemblage of parts subject to uniform established proportions, regulated by the office that each part has to perform.
Whereas the orders were essentially structural in Ancient Greek architecture, which made little use of the arch until its late period, in Roman architecture where the arch was often dominant, the orders became increasingly decorative elements.
There are three distinct orders in Ancient Greek architecture: Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian. These three were adopted by the Romans, who modified their capitals. The Roman adoption of the Greek orders took place in the 1st century BC.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_order
The 10th week of the residency with Mallis Workshop brought ‘Rough Framing.’
Within rough framing there is perhaps no better moment that dances between the ‘orders’ of utilitarian performance than bracing. Proper ‘Bracing’ makes me think of Miles Davis recording ‘Kind of Blue’. The baseball metaphor might consider a pick-up sandlot game of ‘Over the Line’ with the likes of Mike Trout, Shohei Ohtani, Juan Soto, and Mookie Betts. This moment of ‘Bracing’ is so expressive, performative, and intuitive, that not even the master framer can predetermine the representational forms that get collaged from the loose 2x4s, 2x10s, ladders, string, and scraps left scattered amongst the site. These ‘Scraps’, not left for gone, but instead intentionally placed for this space of unintentional discovery. An extraordinary moment that presents us with the central order of pure utility mixed with playful self-expression.
From Left to Right
‘The Ionic Order of Homewood’
4x16, Simpson bucket with hex screws, 4x4 post, 2x4’s, nails, and string.
115 - 1/4 in x Cut on Site in x Cut on Site
‘The Doric Order of Homewood’
4x12 in Simpson bucket with hex screws, 4x4 post, 2x4’s, and nails.
115 - 1/4 in x Cut on Site in x Cut on Site
‘The Corinthian Order of Homewood’
4x6’s, 2x4, 2x12, ladder, string, and nails.
107 - 1/4 in x Cut on Site x Cut on Site
Two months into the artist residency with @mallisworkshop The construction site is a sacred space. From the choreography of a 40 ton crane to pouring concrete that dances between grit and plywood, it all matters. Maintain the consistent presence of the day to day, don’t let one nail get swept into the crawl space. From the lens 📷 of @taiyo_watanabe 🙏
‘Lunch Box and Steel Toe Boots’
found delicately resting against the Andy Gump
it made its way to the gallery platform
then back to the trenches for hauling dirt
it finally ventured off the site 🙏
‘Lunch Box and Steel Toe Boots’
48” x 65” x 48”
Found Wheelbarrow left in Cement and Aggregate place on 1/4 Mirror and Cement Block
2024
Got a new pair of ‘Blue Suede Boots’ and a set of ‘5 gallon buckets’.
4000 PSI Concrete and Pigments
At the end of today’s pour Danny gave me his boots to pour some concrete into. A pair of ‘Blue Suede Boots’ 🥂🙏
‘A good friend of mine used to say, “This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains.” Think about that for a while.’
Nuke Laloosh, Bull Durham 1988
Week 06 of my artist residency with @mallisworkshop and fortunately it hasn’t rained yet, but the rain will come. Time to pour concrete, time for the foundation, time for the roof, protect us from the rain, allow the cones to catch the rest.
a series of ‘Conecrete’ works
4000 psi concrete and pigments
28 in x 15 in x 15 in
2024
Prepping for some ‘Conecrete’ work.
4000 psi concrete and pigments
28 in x 15 in x 15 in
Edition of 4
2024
Stack of Concrete Drawings
‘Trying to Dig like Tony Gywnn’
Running time: Two Minutes and Ten Seconds
You know what the difference between hitting .250 and .300 is? It’s 25 hits. Twenty-five hits in 500 at-bats is 50 points, OK? There’s six months in a season. That’s about 25 weeks. That means if you get just one extra flare a week, just one, a gork, a ground ball — a ground ball with eyes! — you get a dying quail, just one more dying quail a week and you’re in Yankee Stadium. You still don’t know what I’m talking about, do you?
— Crash Davis, Bull Durham 1988
Thoughts about digging, the unknown, what you can’t see, the negative space. An opportunity for discovery and at the same time a moment to get lost. Trying not to miss the hidden layers within the drawing beneath the Alluvium. I learned a few new things this past week…
Alluvium (from Latin alluvius, from alluere ‘to wash against’) is loose clay, silt, sand, or gravel that has been deposited by running water in a stream bed, on a floodplain, in an alluvial fan or beach, or in similar settings.
I feel like I’ve always been a digger, more comfortable within the playful mess of subtraction, searching for the positive within the void, the shadow adjacent to the light. What’s the difference between hitting 250 and 300 in a dig? I think it requires you to get into the pit and search for that moment when the wind travels between the dust. To hit 300 within the trench still means you’re going to fail, you’ll just get more opportunities to get your hands and boots dirty. Thanks Crash🥂
‘Rebar Makes me Smile’
24 in x 18 in
Inverted Marking Paint on Bent Rebar with Bolt
2024
‘Horizon Lines for Trench Footing’
30 in x 50 in
Inverted Marking Paint and Chalk on Archival Paper
2024
‘Portrait of an Artist (Pool with Seven Figures)’
I believe in the Church of Baseball. I’ve tried all the major religions and most of the minor ones. And the only church that truly feeds the soul, day-in day-out, is the Church of Baseball.
— Annie Savoy, Bull Durham 1988
The construction site is a sacred space, when you’re there around 6:30 am right before sunrise there is this quietness, a slow transition between night and day. A quiet, that slowly…then suddenly, creeps into sharp rattles and roars of machinery. It’s been three weeks into this residency with Mallis Workshop and more questions begin to form. A constant presence to find these opportunities between construction and landscape, architecture and art, material and process. How do you articulate the space in between these things? How can art, architecture, construction, landscape, context, and process work interdependently. Nothing finished, nothing precious, just constant presence and process towards an abstract idea ahead of us. How do we find the opportunities within every dig, every pour, every RFI, every tree, every crane, every morning, every pose, every conversation, and every drive. The Sky Line Crane series, articulates the underpainting between this. Just place the sheets of paper underneath the rig and let the weight, the boots, the 4x4’s, the dirt, the pigments, the crew, the process, and the water do the rest. How does a crane paint, like a child, as it doesn’t know anything else. From the noise, from the heaviness, from the mess, comes something light, something soft, something fragile, something precious. The Construction site is a sacred space.
‘The images are designed, so that after you see the picture two or three times, its no longer my film, it starts to be your film, You recognize the people, you know them, and you don’t even know who directed the picture. PlayTime is nobody.’
Jacques Tati
Week 02 of my artist residency with Mallis brought a range of site activation… digging, excavating, surveying, cleaning, notating, digging, excavating, surveying, cleaning, and notating. Juan Carlos noticed how the light was creating a rainbow through the water while he was hosing down the hillside after backfilling, he took a series of four photographs for me that I titled ‘Rainbow Matrix’.
In order of appearance.
‘Crow’
24” x 36” x 36”
Excavator Bucket leaned against cast in place concrete wall
2024
‘Two Times’
24”x 36” x 3”
Chalk and Nail on Concrete Slab with 1/8” Hole
2024
‘Pythagorean’s Theorem’
40”x 60” x 3”
Oil Stick, 2x4’s and nails on 1/2 inch Plywood
2024
‘Pool Time with Hockney and Heizer’
240”x 120” x 10”
Debris removed from Concrete Pool
2024
‘Balanced Counterweight’
72” x 20” x 1-1/2”
Stone and 2x4 on CMU Block
2024
‘Rainbow Matrix’
38” x 30” x 3”
Archival Prints, Nails, and 2x4’s on 1/2 inch Plywood
2024
Baseball may be a religion full of magic, cosmic truth and the fundamental ontological riddles of our time, but it’s also a job.
-- Annie Savoy, Bull Durham 1988
Week 01 of my artist residency with @mallisworkshop Going to be a long season that will require, routine, consistency, patience, presence, and discipline. Makes me think of Cal Ripken, the ‘Iron Man’, maybe not the five tool player like Trout or Ohtani, but he showed up to work every single day for 2,632 games. A sublime act that will forever stand. Give into the process of the day to day and allow for one game to add to another, one series at a time.
A few sculptural works from week 01
In order of appearance from Left to Right
'Lunch Box and Steel Toe Boots"
40” x 62” x 30”
Found Wheelbarrow left in Cement and Aggregate
2024
‘Levitated Mass at Homewood’
60” x 15” x 10”
Found Skyline Crane
2024
‘Compressing Blue in Green’ (ode to Miles)
48” x 48” x 24”
Found Painted Timber, Plywood, and Steel
2024
'Sweep in a Circle'
48” (diameter)
Cement and Aggregate
2024
'Don't take the Boxes'
24” x 48” x 24”
Found Stacked Boxes
2024
‘Pickup Game’
48” x 18” x 24”
Found Pick Ax and Rope
2024
‘Where’s the Handle’
12” x 30” x 3”
Found Shovel, Placed between Studs
2024
