My work explores the juxtapositions between rot and regeneration, discard and reclamation, destruction and temporal re-emergence using sculptural methods of mold-making and casting.
This current series combines dead fragments or discarded objects. Some of the found-objects are natural, such as rotten tree stumps, while other found-objects are man made, like a broken parks department lamp post.
Some of these objects have been repurposed by pioneering organisms including insects, barnacles, fungi, and plant life.
The process begins with object-seeking. I select found objects which project both abandonment and potential. These hosts are molded in silicone rubber and casted in Hydrostone, a strengthened plaster, or white pigmented cement. The casts are left ghostly matte and bare to reference death masks in homage to the objects’ prior-lives.
Death masks were impressions taken directly from a deceased persons face and cast in either wax or plaster to remember and preserve a likeness. In that spirit, I take cast impressions directly from discarded or rotting objects as a method of preservation, elevation, and remembrance. Then by integrating castings of new life such as insects and plant forms, I hope to work within the continuums between past and present, rot and rebirth.
This pioneering insect and plant life is represented in the form of sculpted or cast bronze or silver. While the matte plaster host objects absorb light, the shimmering polished bronze or silver of the living organisms reflects light and suggests movement and life.
Email: tcmonsees@yahoo.com