Book of Mongō (Chapters 1-3), 100 X 24 X 6”, stoneware, glaze, underglaze, acrylic, 2025
Book of Mongō is a sculptural book inspired by our dependence upon the machine. We love the machine. It has become an idol of worship, but fixing it is beyond the skill set of most consumers. We call upon a shamanic repair specialist to diagnose the mysterious object, only to be told “It’s cheaper to just replace the whole thing.” We hate the machine. It separates us from nature, severing our connection to our primal selves. Yet according to the concept of nonseparation, we are the machine.
Around the inception of this project, I was experiencing bell’s palsy, a viral infection in the nervous system that causes partial facial paralysis. I began to connect my own experience with my body to that of the machine. When one part breaks, the system no longer works, and a cascade of failure is inevitable.
In the Book of Mongō, the components exist in the in-between creating an exchange—such as an adapter, nozzle, or plug—between the organic and inorganic, the absurd and the practical, the representational and the abstract, the haptic and the dream-state, the secular and the religious. In Book of Mongō there exists an overwhelming need to connect, to communicate. But to what? To God? To the universe? To each other?
Flag is a result of experiential research into the borderlands of Southern Arizona and northern Sonora, including conversations with coyotes, migrants, and diplomats as well as visits to migrant shelters, produce shipping facilities, Ford maquiladoras, and shrimp farms. We often see the international border as a bold line on a map or an iron wall through the desert, but the real border is a complex network of interconnectedness and interdependence, like the metaphor of Indra’s jeweled net. Flag attempts to erase the American and Mexican flags with a matrix of lines bridging the gap between nations, challenging the viewer to see both the parts and the whole.
Cover and interior Illustrations, Rim to River, 2022
Official selection of the 2024 Association of University Presses Book, Jacket, and Journal Show
Book design by Leigh McDonald
Santa Rita Mountains, Looking West
Reduction Linoleum Block Print
approx. 14X14″
2023
Prints available for purchase at ARID LANDS.
Sunrise, Rincon Mountains
Reduction Linoleum Block Print
approx. 8 X 10″
2022
In Vivo, First Phase & In Vivo, Second Phase
(from the Field Notes from the Astral Plane series)
Monotype and gold leaf, approx. 10 X 6.5″ each
2022
Monotypes available for purchase
Selections from the Rim to River series
(from top left: Cairn 4, Cairn 2, Cairn 3,
Lecheguilla, Read Outside, Catalina Highway)
Pen and Ink, 4X4″
2022
Giclee prints available for purchase
Reduction Linoleum Block Print
approx. 10 X 20″
2022
prints available for purchase at MESA Shop
California Kingsnake (desert phase) & Sonoran Mountain Kingsnake
Linoleum Block Print
Approx. 10X10″
2022
available for purchase
Reduction Linoleum Block Print
approx. 10X19′
2021
Dragoon Mountains Looking East (Sunset)
Reduction Linoleum Block Print
approx. 17X3.5″
2021
After the Rain, Dragoon Mountains
Reduction Linoleum Block Print
approx. 17X3.5″
2021
available for purchase
Desert Bloom
Reduction Linoleum Block Print
approx. 10X10″
2019
Porter McDonald 