Vanishing Horizon
‘Vanishing Horizon’—a panoramic intervention into the urban landscape, an unlikely mirage frozen in space and time, an illusion made tangible.
Throughout my life I have experienced landscapes as animated, storied and expressive. Landscapes have told me of myth born of earth and sky; of time spinning forward and backward; of the potency of spirit within land. My lived experiences of our planet contradict the colonial assumptions that inform the culturally and politically human-centric attitude about the natural world—as passive, containable and extractable. Within every landscape are stories that have been silenced, obliterated and buried—stories that haunt the land as ghosts.
In 2021 I made a journey to the landscapes of the American west. During my drives through the vast desert landscapes, I was entranced by the disorienting effect of mirages. Mirages would appear on flat expansive areas that had once been inland oceans. These lands—some of which are below sea level—will be underwater once again in the future. I wondered if the mirage is an apparition of the land remembering the past? Or a shadow cast by future events? In this space of questioning the horizon becomes unfixed; more than a metaphor for ‘past’ and ‘future’—it is the birthplace of time itself. Thoughts like these become unshakable, they loosen one's attachment to empirical reasoning, and open up the mind to the genuine mystery of existence. I realized that to travel through time one need only look to the horizon.
Let’s think for a minute about what it means to live in an urban environment where the horizon has been eclipsed by dense development. What do we lose when we lose sight of the horizon—a view that reminds us of the vast but finite body of our planet? ‘Vanishing Horizon’ inserts a horizon line and vanishing point onto an otherwise densely developed landscape, extending the viewer's sightline beyond the work itself and into the obfuscated, distant horizon. If the original intention of panorama paintings from the ‘Age of Enlightenment’ was to give the viewer an extended view of landscape, ‘Vanishing Horizon’ gives the viewer an extended view of time within the landscape.
‘Vanishing Horizon’ is an ocular and somatic experience. Viewers walk into the center of a 100’ diameter floating reflective ring whose edges ripple and fragment like a disturbed pool. From this shifted vantage point, the surface of the sculpture rests just below eye level and mirrors the surrounding landscape, appearing as though submerged in water.
Mirages themselves are unfixed illusions created by heat and light. ‘Mirage’ describes things that appear real or possible but are not. ‘Vanishing Horizon’ poses an imagined view of our planet's collective future in the face of anthropogenic climate change. To enter the dreaming space of the horizon is to be humbled that we are contained by a finite planet. The mirage takes our eyes on a journey that leads back to ourselves—the central point within a ripple of immense change.
Throughout my life I have experienced landscapes as animated, storied and expressive. Landscapes have told me of myth born of earth and sky; of time spinning forward and backward; of the potency of spirit within land. My lived experiences of our planet contradict the colonial assumptions that inform the culturally and politically human-centric attitude about the natural world—as passive, containable and extractable. Within every landscape are stories that have been silenced, obliterated and buried—stories that haunt the land as ghosts.
In 2021 I made a journey to the landscapes of the American west. During my drives through the vast desert landscapes, I was entranced by the disorienting effect of mirages. Mirages would appear on flat expansive areas that had once been inland oceans. These lands—some of which are below sea level—will be underwater once again in the future. I wondered if the mirage is an apparition of the land remembering the past? Or a shadow cast by future events? In this space of questioning the horizon becomes unfixed; more than a metaphor for ‘past’ and ‘future’—it is the birthplace of time itself. Thoughts like these become unshakable, they loosen one's attachment to empirical reasoning, and open up the mind to the genuine mystery of existence. I realized that to travel through time one need only look to the horizon.
Let’s think for a minute about what it means to live in an urban environment where the horizon has been eclipsed by dense development. What do we lose when we lose sight of the horizon—a view that reminds us of the vast but finite body of our planet? ‘Vanishing Horizon’ inserts a horizon line and vanishing point onto an otherwise densely developed landscape, extending the viewer's sightline beyond the work itself and into the obfuscated, distant horizon. If the original intention of panorama paintings from the ‘Age of Enlightenment’ was to give the viewer an extended view of landscape, ‘Vanishing Horizon’ gives the viewer an extended view of time within the landscape.
‘Vanishing Horizon’ is an ocular and somatic experience. Viewers walk into the center of a 100’ diameter floating reflective ring whose edges ripple and fragment like a disturbed pool. From this shifted vantage point, the surface of the sculpture rests just below eye level and mirrors the surrounding landscape, appearing as though submerged in water.
Mirages themselves are unfixed illusions created by heat and light. ‘Mirage’ describes things that appear real or possible but are not. ‘Vanishing Horizon’ poses an imagined view of our planet's collective future in the face of anthropogenic climate change. To enter the dreaming space of the horizon is to be humbled that we are contained by a finite planet. The mirage takes our eyes on a journey that leads back to ourselves—the central point within a ripple of immense change.
