About This Piece

There are three wall mounted constructions that make up “Model State: A Local Cosmology.” They each measure 16’x24’x8’, with some dimensions varying. The materials used are polyester resin and fiberglass coating over hand-modeled and cast forms, in addition to fiberglass tubing and metal brackets. All elements are painted entirely in flat black.  All three pieces are located in the same general area on the 14^th St. side lobby, exhibition level. One of the pieces hangs dramatically over a stairwell and the other two flank the main entrance to the vast convention hall.

The construct of each piece is similar to that of a snap-apart sprue system found in toy model car kits.  Instead of car parts, these are objects that are relevant to the state of Colorado.  Some objects in the piece refer to the land (no mountains though).  Some refer to industry, the people, our history and prehistory, other art works, and some objects are less identifiable.  The system of tubing, elbows and “T’s” that connect the objects together, in composition, are both physical and metaphorical.  Through the use of physical connections, the notion of interdependence is brought to bare among the disparate facets of Colorado.

To bring some cohesion to the many different aspects of our state, each of the three pieces has a title and a theme.  The first is “Marking the Land.”  It focuses on the way people, animals, industry and others have marked the landscape.  The second is “Survival.” This piece concentrates on the species, past and present, who have played a pivotal role in shaping the identity of Colorado.  Finally, “Artifacts.”  This is the most abstracted of the three in the way that its objects mimic some of the icons in our state.

Some of the parts are readily identifiable, such as a man with a shovel seen in “Marking the Land.”  There are other objects which suggest things seen in our local collective memory.  For example, one form in “Artifacts” could either be a snow fence or a railroad trellis.