COLLECTION SERIES, 2021
Collection is a series of an assortment of large oil paintings depicting detailed studies of the surface of rocks and fossils found on the shores of Lake Michigan. The inspiration for this work comes from a life spent engrossed in nature and an enthusiasm for detail. As a child, my family spent summers vacationing in various campgrounds in Northern Michigan. I was an explorer from an early age, and quickly developed a love for treasure hunting in the Great Lakes. The process of painting these collected stones mimics the intensive hunt for rocks, as it takes patience and careful, vigilant surveillance in order to notice and capture tiny details. Through this series, I intend for viewers to find life in these stones, to see them as valuable works of art created by nature. I believe that the Earth creates its own art, telling stories of life, of chaos, of change through the layers of bedrock that reside all around us. Remnants of organisms preserved in mineral deposits, porous volcanic stone, conglomerate hodgepodges of various materials all wash up on beaches, allowing us a window into the distant past.
I've Got a Bone to Pick
55" x 72" oil on canvas |
Kaleidoscope Desert
36" x 48" oil on canvas |
Margarita with Salt on the Rim
24" x 36" oil on canvas |
Space Donut
24" x 36" oil on canvas |
One Small Step for Man
24" x 36" oil on canvas |
Honeycomb Lace
24" x 36" oil on canvas |
LAKE MICHIGAN FOSSILS
KELLEY, ROBERT W. GUIDE TO MICHIGAN FOSSILS. DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES, 1962.
Most fossils found in Michigan date back several hundred million years when the warm, clear, salt-water Paleozoic seas were entering the Michigan basin. Most of the creatures preserved from those ancient seas are the many various types of lime-secreting shellfish and corals whose remains, incidentally, make up a very large part of present limestone beds. Occasionally, parts of primitive fish are found. Also, in the coal measures, carbonized impressions of ancient plant parts are not uncommon.
The most common type of fossilization involves a chemical process where the original organic material is entirely replaced by calcite or silica or some other mineral - a petrification - often resulting in the preservation of infinite detail. There are many other kinds of fossilization, but replacement mineralization gives the paleontologist the opportunity of finding out a great deal about the plants and animals of a certain time period in stone.
KELLEY, ROBERT W. GUIDE TO MICHIGAN FOSSILS. DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES, 1962.
Most fossils found in Michigan date back several hundred million years when the warm, clear, salt-water Paleozoic seas were entering the Michigan basin. Most of the creatures preserved from those ancient seas are the many various types of lime-secreting shellfish and corals whose remains, incidentally, make up a very large part of present limestone beds. Occasionally, parts of primitive fish are found. Also, in the coal measures, carbonized impressions of ancient plant parts are not uncommon.
The most common type of fossilization involves a chemical process where the original organic material is entirely replaced by calcite or silica or some other mineral - a petrification - often resulting in the preservation of infinite detail. There are many other kinds of fossilization, but replacement mineralization gives the paleontologist the opportunity of finding out a great deal about the plants and animals of a certain time period in stone.
"Isabella Brand, Sophie Linden, Riley Parrish, and Olivia Prado ... enrolled in an Integrative Project Class, a year-long course [closing] with a senior exhibition at the end of the year. When the school’s in-person exhibition was canceled due to COVID-19, Brand, Linden, Parrish, and Prado decided to hold their own exhibition in order to have a live audience see the works in person."