The wall
‘The wall’ is a visual portrait of the border territory between the US and Mexico. In this project, the artist traveled to different sections of the border region, crisscrossing back and forth, interviewing local community members, and documenting the diverse terrain. The result is a series of black and white watercolor paintings ranging from small, intimate views to a large mural. The paintings show various types of border wall, from tall steel barricades, to sheet-metal fences, to historic concrete markers. Within this terrain, stories are layered on top of one another, or erased completely from the effects of weather and time.
Ungoverned spaces
In this project, the artist collaborated with anthropologist Noah Coburn to confront the challenges of representing different perceptions of conflict in Afghanistan during the US occupation. Featuring a thirty-five foot long panoramic painting of the Shomali Plain north of Kabul as well as smaller paintings, photographs, video, written accounts, and interviews, the project takes stock of the present political and social upheaval in Afghanistan as well as looks back to the history of conflict and forward to the legacy of US intervention. In the panorama installation, dramatic mountains and lush fields contrast with barbed wire and concrete blast walls, creating a representation of the fractured political and social lives that people lead around the Bagram Airbase.
Highway
In ‘Highway’, the artist creates hyper-realistic drawings to chronicle the modern transformation of the Grand Trunk Road in India. Part of one of Asia’s ancient trade routes, the section of the road connecting Delhi and Kolkata was renovated during a national infrastructure campaign. This project offers a clinical examination of the road and merges images with oral histories to create a rich and layered experience. The artist executed a drawing every 76 kilometers breaking the 1,500 km (900+ miles) road into 20 equal segments and then interviewed people whom he met along the road.
