STONE

Stone is an unforgiving mistress. A cold, hard, elemental beauty, such stuff as worlds are made of ... the stuff of the Earth. The entire drama of human life in all its heroic folly is played out on a stage of stone. And when the final curtain falls, when actor and audience depart, stone is all that remains.

Hope granite, 7' high, Ki'mchon, Korea. Located in the K'imchon Sculpture Park, next to a children's hospital.

Peace Table granite, 14' high. Located at the United Nations Korean War Memorial Park in Pusan, Korea. In commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Korean War. One artist from each of the 22 countries involved in the conflict was invited to make a work to commemorate the war. The North Koreans and Chinese were not invited ... pity.

Islands in the Stream marble, 6' high, Carrara, Italy. A map of the heavens. Title from Hemingway.

The Forgotten Country Japanese granite, 7’ (2 m ) long, Sozo No Mori Sculpture Park, Fujimi, Japan

Sei Carrara marble, 7' long. Fukuhara Gakuen University, Kitakyushu, Japan. Sei is a japanese word meaning birth, life, nature or manufactured product.

Twilight mudstone, 30” long

Mesozoic Bench 6’ long x 9’ high

Precambrian Memory steel and stone, 8’ high. The last in a series of landscapes that started in the 80s.

The Pleiades stone and steel, 10’ high

Jurassic Forest Steel and river pebbles, 9’ high

Cataloochee steel and river pebbles, 8’ high. Named from the creek where the pebbles were gathered on slopes of the eastern Smokies.

Cherokee painted steel and stone, 9' high. Homage to the Cherokee people. Stones gathered from creeks in Smoky Mountains. Design based on motifs from traditional Cherokee gourd art.

Translunar Paradise

Genesis granite and painted steel, 7' high. A metaphor for cosmic creation.

Star Map stone and steel, 3m high

WOOD

The air exhaled by the sculptor walking in the forest sustains the tree he will later carve. And the wood carved by the sculptor came from the tree that once gave him oxygen. We are part of the same system, trees and people, connected by shared air.

Ocean Murmurs 7' high Japanese cedar and camphor wood

Venus Camphor wood

Sea Child camphor wood, 6' high. Based on an argonaut shell brought to my feet by wind and waves during a typhoon on a beach in western Japan.

Growth walnut 40" high

The Architect’s Dream camphor wood, 4’ long by 4’ wide by 40” high (without base).

Moon Goddess sweet gum and tulip poplar

Rapture walnut, 20” high

Urban Man camphor wood, 5’ 6” high (front and back)

Mythological Landscape camphor wood, 30" long (76 cm)

Fairy Ring Japanese cedar and wood chips. About 20" in diameter (6 m). Kyushu Prefecture Art Museum. The wood chips came from the carving process. I saved these logs from the construction company that cut down an entire forest and subsequently ground the forest into pulp.

The Sea's Birthday wood and beach pebbles, 7' (2 m) long. Title from a poem my wife wrote as a child.

Landscape in Wood 3’ (1 m ) long

The Sound of Waves wood and beach pebbles, 22" long. Purchased by the Bonheur Children’s Hospital in Memphis.

Citified red oak, 3’ (1 m) high. Windfall from Hurricane Fran.

Table with Stone Japanese pine and beach pebbles, about 6’ long

METAL

Each material has its own unique set of associations, a fact not often acknowledged by Modernism's focus on form and the Postmodern emphasis on content. Steel and bronze are industrial products, with longstanding associations with machines, war and masculinity (think engines, bullets, samurai swords). The sculptor can choose to evoke these associations or use them ironically, but cannot ignore them.

Steampunk Babylon steel and bronze, 10' high

Enigma steel and bronze 9’ high, Chicago

Babel steel, 8' high. Figures within the city can be seen prostrating themselves in prayer before a giant cell phone... Do cities grow organically from nature like a tree or are cities built on the dead stumps of a ruined nature?

Tree of Good and Evil painted steel, 10' high. A Biblical metaphor for our relationship with technology.

Under a Starry Sky bronze, 10' diameter Fine Arts College, Shanghai. One night on planet Earth.

Driving to the Western Paradise bronze, 7' (2 m without base). Changshou Park, Shanghai. A sardonic commentary on the Chinese mad rush to emulate western-style capitalism. The Chinese government, not pleased with the sculpture's message, changed the title (after I'd left the country) to something less politically charged. China's elite are eager to imitate the West's lust for profit but not its democratic ideals nor its freedom of expression.

Amrita Devi steel and bronze, 10’ high. In 18th century Rajasthan Amrita Devi and her daughters sacrificed themselves to save a sacred forest from the king’s wood cutters. Their sacrifice inspired India’s 20th century Chipko Movement which in turn influenced the tree huggers in the West.

Nova painted steel, 8’ high

Caprice painted steel, 11’ high

The Forest at Night painted steel, 11' high

Motor City steel and bronze, 10’ high

Garden of Night steel on wood, 6' high

Urban Man II steel and bronze, 7’ high,

Stranger in a Strange Land steel and bronze, 7' high. A future Moses wandering a wasted ecosystem where technology has run amok. Another figure can be seen inside the sculpture, arms raised in supplication toward the heavens .....

Night steel and bronze, 9' high. A chronicle of the Sixth Extinction from about 40,000 years ago to the present. Species already extinct (including mammoths, moas, dodos, Tasmanian tigers, etc.) are on the left side. Currently endangered animals (monarchs, elephants, cheetahs, etc.) are on the right. On top are the baiji dolphins of China, the most recent large mammal to be extinguished by humans (2007). Biologists predict 50% of all species alive in the 20th century will be extinct or critically endangered by the end of this century ...

Wheel of Life bronze and painted steel, 8' high (2.5 m). The evolution of technology into increasingly more destructive expressions. Civilization is destroyed. A new civilization rises from the ashes. The karmic cycle continues.

Brave New Worlds Steel and cast bronze and aluminum, 10' high. The biosphere transformed into the technosphere. "O brave new world, that has such creatures in it!"

Ark painted steel, 8' high. This work can be interpreted in one of two ways: As a metaphor for our role as the stewards, the captains (the "Noahs") of Ark Earth. The work can also be seen in a darker light: a preview of a future when either because of war or environmental devastation, we are compelled to build a space ark and colonize other worlds, carrying with us those plants and animals necessary for our survival.

St. Elmo powder coated steel, 15' high, Chattanooga, TN, 2014. A history of Chattanooga from Pre-Columbian times through the Trail of Tears, the rise of slavery, the Civil War and to the present. The figures are gas welded steel (no bronze).

Plato's Playground painted steel, 10' high

Orpheus steel and bronze, 10’ high

The Watchtower steel and bronze

High Rise 9' high (2.7 m) steel and bronze. The city defined: 1. a cultural hub of near constant sensory stimulation, intellectual exchange and movement 2. The soaring towers that indicate the presence of civilization 3. The domicile of Homo urbanus 4. The source of our spiritual and psychological disconnect from nature 5. A cancerous growth on the face of the Earth...

The Palace of Night painted steel 10’ high

CERAMICS

Clay is magic... alive... primeval. Limited only by gravity (and the
artist's imagination), in skilled hands it becomes an embryonic fluid that gives birth to form, transforming mud into masterpiece. Is it any wonder that ceramicists are invariably mystics?

Traditionally, clay has been the preferred material for sketching ideas in three dimensions and an intermediary stage for casting. But alas, ceramic sculpture is inherently fragile and thus, not well suited for public art. Ceramic pieces, in my experience, all too often become pieces of ceramics.

Urban Man and Housewife

Babylon 7' high terracotta. Terracotta Sculpture Park for Andalou University, Eskisehir, Turkey.

Nagasaki unglazed stoneware, 16" high. Portrait of the artist's wife whose family was in Nagasaki before, during and after the bombing. Was it necessary to end a war by killing tens of thousands of woman and children? What does that make the victors?

The Sons of Martha stoneware 5' 6" high. Destroyed by Hurricane Fran in 1996.

Maid in Babylon painted clay 2' high.

Technozoic Lizard 40" long

Lizard Car 16" long

Tower an old work I will revisit one day …

Tower of the Sun stoneware on steel

Vessels For 3 years I studied throwing pots at Takatori Kiln in Fukuoka, Japan … until ultimately realizing that I was not destined to be a potter. The tedium of making the same form ad nauseam was not for me …

PAINTINGS

From ancient Greece to modern times thinkers have wasted a lot of verbiage debating the relative merits of painting versus sculpture. Both have advantages and both have disadvantages. But they are as different as poetry and music and are therefore, hard to compare. For me, painting is a way to relax, an escape from the blood, sweat and toil of working stone and steel.

Yama oil on canvas, 25"x 35"

The Light in the Forest oil on canvas 22" x 26"

High Tide oil on canvas 3’x 4’

Hunting Island Marsh oil on canvas 32”x48”

Carolina, 1491 oil on canvas, 21” x 26”. The Outer Banks before the arrival of the Europeans and the subsequent extinction of the Carolina parakeet.

Sphinx oil on canvas 4' x 4' (unfinished)

Trees and Monkeys oil on canvas, 5' long. A view of the forest of Yakushima, Japan, one of most beautiful and largely pristine landscapes left in Japan.

Voyage oil on canvas 4'x5', A visual metaphor for the artist's journey.

Hide and Seek oil on canvas, 2'x 3'

Portrait of Orrin Pilkey oil on canvas, 42” x 52”

PRINTS and DRAWINGS

Drawing is the most ancient of the arts. Most of the so-called Paleolithic cave paintings are in fact charcoal drawings. One can imagine some Stone Age Adam or Eve scratching lines in the dirt with a finger and pondering the meaning of the marks. More than any other medium, save perhaps clay, drawing offers an immediate and direct connection between mind, hand and artwork. It's an activity we've all been doing since childhood. In that sense, we are all artists.

By contrast, printmaking is a more indirect process. One must construct in metal or wood or some other suitable material, a plate or template for making multiple copies. Over time, I've become less interested in complex chemical processes such as etching, in favor of the simplicity of woodcuts and drypoint.

Moon Garden color pencil and pastel 18" x 24"

Tower of Babel color pencil 16” x 20”

Khmer Girl pastel pencil

My Life as a Tree pencil 5” x 16”

Citified mixed media 18" x 30"

Motor City Shrine color pencil and pastel 18" x 24"

Emergence woodcut 15" x 18"

Eve woodcut 15” x 18”

Genesis etching

Solitude mezzotint 7” x 7.5”

Yesterday’s Children intaglio 7” x 10”

St. George and the Dragon etching, 4” x 6”

BOOKS

What’s Off The North Carolina Coast (NOAA, Coastwatch, March 26, 2025)

Escaping Nature How to Survive Global Climate Change (Duke Press, 2024)

The Magic Dolphin A Young Human's Guide to Beaches, Sea Level Rise, and Living with the Sea (Ingram, 2018)

Lessons from the Sand Family Friendly Science Activities You Can Do On A Carolina Beach (UNC Press, 2016)

Off the North Carolina Coast Online article about an imaginary submersible cruising along the seafloor from Cape Hatteras toward the deep abyssal plains.

https://ncseagrant.ncsu.edu/coastwatch/spring-2025-off-the-nc-coast/

Escaping Nature How to Survive Global Climate Change (Duke Press, March 12, 2024)

The Magic Dolphin A Young Human’s Guide To Beaches, Sea Level Rise And Living With The Sea (Ingram, 2018)

Lessons from the Sand A beach science activity book for kids interested in marine science.

ILLUSTRATIONS

Illustrations for published books and articles, writings not yet published, and those “orphans of the mind” that may never be published. Most are a mix of pastel pencils and/or digital processes.