Economies of Trade

From the artist: This series investigates historic and contemporary narratives of power and perspective through the familiarity of the vessel, assembled as stacked parts, embedded with an accumulation of cultural objects. The recognition of the vessel form serves as an entry point to challenge the presumptive neutrality of material, and asks the viewer to step closer to understand layers of context. These pieces consider the extraction and production of tea, sugar, coffee, salt, and other systems to examine economies of control that constitute migration, occupation, commodification, and labor. With discursive content, the objects signify the monumental and mundane, function and adornment, domestic and sacred across time and place.