19″ x 13 1/2″ x 2 3/4”
Homemade paper (pulp made from soldiers’ letters to mothers from various wars, ink retrieved from letters, cotton); hair flower braided by a widow; fragments of military blankets and uniforms from various wars; colored paper, silk, ribbon, dried chrysanthemums, magnolia, white pine, ash, poplar
In 1977, NASA launched two probes with “Golden Records” representing Earth’s life and cultures, and edited to present humanity’s “best face forward.” Ancient Beacons Long for Notice—the third video in a trilogy—explores the challenge of representing humanity through a single object. What is our moral obligation to a “full accounting” of our actions in perpetuity, off-planet, and to unknown beings?
Commissioned by the Amon Carter Museum of American Art and Santa Barbara Museum of Art.