• art
  • love
  • art
  • life
  • art
Loaded

EPICEDIO
1994
Hand-sculpted Carrara marble slabs.
17 x 17 x 1.2 in.

During a trip to the Orinoco River in the Venezuelan rainforest, I photographed animal tracks left in the sand and on the riverbanks. Back in Caracas, at the paleo-biology lab of Universidad Simón Bolívar, I identified each imprint and selected those by animals that were in critical danger of extinction. After that, I carved the tracks on marble, by hand, at a scale larger than the original size, and identified them with their creole name, Latin nomenclature, and grade of extinction.

The title Epicedio refers to an ancient Greek lyric sung to a dead warrior. The project was my way of honoring these creatures, whose ecosystems have been destroyed along with their lives.​

Prev
Au Revoir Les Enfants
Next
Flight