University of Alaska Anchorage, Kimura Gallery, 1999

This place-specific installation happened to coincide with the 10th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, and allowed me to explore the story of Alaska.  I see the story of this state as a story of the United States—a story of Manifest Destiny—Seward's folly becoming a province of plundering, a land of exploitation.  Bisecting a rectangular 35' x 6' bed of gravel, a line of oil flowed down an 18' long spruce beam, pouring into the first of four circular pans.  These pans, 2' in diameter, were filled with oil and hanging above each of these pans was a gall bladder filled with oil.  Behind the spruce beam rose a totem towards the ceiling and attached to this timber were the skulls of seven animals indigenous to Alaska: Beluga whale, polar bear, wolf, sea lion, sea otter, fur seal, and Chinook salmon.