Untitled (Desert Refractions) (2021)

Untitled (Desert Refractions)(2021) is a sculpture, installation and performance created in response to the reflective glass surfaces of many Las Vegas Resorts, the desert environment, the arc of the sun, and the poem Ozymandias. The work explores reflection, opulence, sunlight, legacy, and the impermanence of power. Devised with local performers, the piece included both pre-recorded and live-streamed light as the Las Vegas sun set in real-time.

Ozymandias 

BY PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY

I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said ‘Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.’

Untitled (Desert Refractions) sculpture, a collaboration with Luis Varela-Rico, permanently installed at Rogers Studio Gallery. Each of the gold panes of glass points towards a major resort with gold windows. Excerpts from the poem Ozymandias are sandblasted into the glass with industrial garnet and sand from the nearby Red Rock Canyon desert. Detailing with pyrite grit and fake gold spraypaint. The piece changes depending on the angle of the sun. Solar lights illuminate the sculpture at night.

Untitled (Desert Refractions) long-term installation of gold/silver window film at the Rogers Studio Gallery. The windows of the Studio Gallery take on the reflective quality of opulent local resort windows.