UMO's

UMO's: Useless Metal Objects 2005-2009

What’s cluttering your attic or basement? Perhaps like most Americans you, too, have piles of items you couldn’t live without but now find their place in boxes or storage closets destined for Goodwill or other charity stores. Nancy Griffith calls these items useless plastic objects available in the five and dime. Mine are USELESS METAL OBJECTS but are anything other than that. I am trying to make them as evocative and as precious as I possibly can.

I have made 50 of these UMO’s. For some time my primary media has been welded and painted aluminum. I love the power I have to manipulate this lightweight, yet strong, material into whatever form I need. It serves my purpose well in my large-scale outdoor work where abstract figures soar or dance or where water is transformed into a powerful force. In both the UMO’s and larger works I heavily work the surface and add color to make the objects more active and striking. Thus grinding, mark-making, and adding paint, then grinding some more are equal time takers as the building of the objects themselves. Pattern making and surface details are vital.

One additional element completes this recent project. A life-size figure accompanies the UMO’s. “Man Surprised By The Things He’s Made” stands in shock or awe over the 50 metal objects. Thus the tongue-in-cheek nature of the project is complete. The UMO’s are not at all useless. Instead they are to be cherished and treated as the valuable objects they are.
This series of 50 objects varies in size - the tallest is 26".