Fastforwardfossil; Part 1, 2009
#2 harvested plastic, 18′ L x 4’H x 8’W
The sculptural landscape, constructed out of translucent, plastic milk and water bottles, imagines a ghostly and chaotic future. Bottles that contained pure milk and water that once quenched our thirst now end up contaminating and destroying our landscape. FASTFORWARDFOSSIL Part 1 combines views of the Niger Delta and the Port Harcourt oil refinery in Nigeria with the tar sands of Alberta, Canada and other contaminated sites. A surveillance tower overlooks rooftops of tiny houses adrift in a “sea” of plastic. Tiny deforested trees surround an overturned McMansion with it’s construction dumpster still at the ready nearby. A Shell oil billboard perches on the “melting” edge of a large tabletop, a plan view of the Niger Delta–a region which exports a large quantity of crude oil to the United States. A tiny bench with handcuffs sits adjacent to shrunken detention structures, similar to those used in Iraq. These eerie juxtapositions create an uncanny visual experience of the brutality of the oil economy, and the daily chain of events that link First World consumption to developing world devastation.
FASTFORWARDFOSSIL Part 1 was created with assistance from Beth Letain and Alan Carroll. and photographed by Curtis Hamilton
