Leave Only Footprints

Gallery 61, October 2021 - January 2022

Do you remember your last journey into the wilds? You traveled for hours, maybe days, losing cellular reception along the way. Weary, you came to the trailhead in search of the elusive untamed wilderness ready to be awed. You discovered the great trees, the running waters, the high cliffs and ... cigarette butts. Food cartons. Discarded water bottles. Wrappers. Crushed cans and broken beer bottles. Your experience, though awe inspiring, was tainted, soiled and it remained clinging to you like an oily scum that stubbornly refused to be wiped away. This show endeavors to capture that tension between the timeless wonder of exploring nature and the polluted condition we so often leave it in. 

The paintings that made up Leave Only Footprints were made from recycled paper that was, in part, produced from trash recovered from the locations depicted and most of the frames were constructed from wood reclaimed from pallet wood.