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I have lived in Oregon since 2006. As an avid hiker I have seen the summer wildfires becoming increasingly destructive. With each new fire that the forests endure, charred and tortured ruins are left in the fire’s wake. As gusting winds and flames ravage through the land, there is often nothing left but black timber carcasses. These forms take on unique structures and characteristics which resemble their past selves but stand in a new way. I find a destructive beauty in their contorted shapes. I imagine them as figures standing as dead men. Others are nothing more than hollow knights. Roaring winds, scorching flames, and the weight of one another...This all has an increasingly detrimental effect on the land and atmosphere.
Magnificent pillars that once stood through seasons have fallen to fire. The once prominent and soaring trees are increasingly reduced to dead architecture struggling to stand on their own. I imagine timber stacked on top of timber desperately trying to support one another. As I gaze past the beauty I am reminded of the cause and consequences that emerge from each fire. As the climate continues to decline, the chances and magnitude of these fires increases each year. Forests and ecosystems that have thrived for thousands of years will take centuries to recover in a time when land and timber are seen as more of a commodity than a right to the planet. This realization led me to print the work on natural paper, then proceed to do just as had happened to the figures depicted in my images, set fire to them. These images encompass the structures, textures and corrosion of the affected landscape.