Different Speeds At Different Points, 2019

Extending a body of work that explores the inherent optics of glass, water, water lenses, and sunlight, Different Speeds At Different Points experiments, instead, with the higher refractive index of mineral oil (paraffinum perliquidum). While previous works harness water’s phenomenal capability to simultaneously magnify what lies behind it and project the moving image of what lies before it, this piece uses, in it’s place, a liquid by-product of the petroleum refinement process, an industry that increasingly threatens the health of water as a living, life-sustaining force. (Scientific glass sourced by the artist at Universitas Gadga Madah, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, as a Fulbright Scholar.)