These machines are constructed using many similar advanced parts and materials, and, much like classical music composition, they are exercises in variations on a theme. Each machine is designed to traverse a different medium, and incorporate a unique approach for it’s locomotion. Their expressive capacity, however, explores the human fascination towards enhanced human-power, from superhero fantasy, to garage tinkering dreams, to whimsical human folly. In 1995, I received an NEA Fellowship in Sculpture - in recognition for this large kinetic sculptural series.

Dada Rode a Bicycle/MoMA Was a Peddler*

 

Machine No.1

Machine No.2



*Dada refers to the title of a European art movement during World War I, with its wry interest in the machine aesthetic. The bicycle was an image used (read: Rode) by many of this group... especially the artist Marcel Duchamp. MoMA refers to the Museum of Modern Art, in New York City. The museum has long been a standard bearer in Modern Art. MoMA's rise to power, however, can be traced back to the fledgling New York Armory Show of 1913. A then minor European artist was catapulted (read: Peddled) into international stardom there with a small sensationalized painting. The painting was Nude Descending a Staircase. The artist was Marcel Duchamp.