Torn

Torn - wood, metal, stone. 2021

But even those who willingly and excitingly chose to migrate for work, love, or adventure experience a departure from the familiar and secure when entering the foreign and undetermined.

Utilizing preexisting cracks in this piece of wood is much like celebrating those imperfections in a persons’ character - which can be far more interesting than the polished perfection that is advocated throughout advertising and social media.

The fact that the crack is the dominating feature of the piece reinforces the idea that our scars are sometimes our most defining and attractive attributes.

Made from a single piece of spalted sugar maple, Torn “grows” from a base of Faroese basalt.

Those stitches that are used are set away from the crack, exposing a wound that is visual, but left untreated.

Migration is complex and nuanced. Every individual moving from one part of the globe to another, regardless of the reasons, experiences loss, unfamiliarity, and alienation.

Those who are unwillingly moved because of war or persecution may endure these things in heaps by experiencing the death of loved ones, loss of a home and property, and physically taxing evacuation across many borders.