GEOVINE [DECAYED]
CAST IRON, STEEL, BRASS, MDF, PLYWOOD, CAST PLASTIC, ACRYLIC PAINT, LIGHT
50” x 25.5” x 17”
2013 - 2018
RELEVANT EXCERPT FROM
"The Compendium of GeoDinic [Natural] History" :
As the vines age they spread apart, soften, darken and slump. The previously-blue facets have transitioned to purple, and this vine has softened enough that one of its arms has unraveled completely, dropping its section of the Pod onto the pedestal. As perviously noted, the lifecycle of the vines is very long by earth standards: at least 1200 years from germination to death, though neither of those terms apply in the precise sense. They rise from the dust of previous vines as a very light yellow, go from yellow to orange to this dark red, and eventually to black (at which point they are little more than a still-recognizable pile of former arms and stems). After they turn black they become, over perhaps 200 years, a kind-of fossilized version of themselves and turn white, eventually crumbling away to dust. It is from this dust that the new vines are born (the GeoVines do not make seeds), completing their strange life-cycle. It is not known whether the different vines interact in some way to reproduce, nor whether the Pods play a role.
Little is known regarding the specifics of GeoDin’s end. One thing that is known, is that the downfall of GeoDin was not the result of kinetic catastrophe as might be expected. There is no evidence of such an event. It was something else, something much less perceptible, that lead to the rather-quick disillusion of society. This appears to have happened within the span of about two generations, i.e. the parents were born into a thriving society (if one struggling to meet energy demands), and their children found themselves, as adults, simply living in the buildings built by their forebears, apparently without the means to repair infrastructure or operate the complex machinery surrounding them (it seems likely that it was during this time that this museum was set up). Again: there is no evidence of purposeful destruction, of war; no evidence of rampant disease, and there were Pods enough to continue, if not to expand. It was something else.
ABOUT THIS PIECE:
The “oldest” piece, and the last one completed. It was also by far the most complicated and difficult to fabricate. This one started with a small drawing of pen and colored pencil, and ended up looking (more-or-less) exactly as designed (this drawing can be seen on my website). The Pods are all made of MDF, which worked well bc of its homogeneity and because it holds extremely well with super-glue (cyanoacrylate), while the vines are made of plywood (good for its light weight, dimensional stability, and relative strength given the forms involved). But neither of these materials would work for the more spindly forms on this piece. For these I ended up using mahogany, cut into pieces so that the grain runs parallel to the forms, with the connections between pieces reinforced with small steel rods and epoxy.
I spent quite a lot of time on a kind of “periodic table” of vine colors, though I never quite completed it. You can view it here in its incomplete state.