Coming and Going: A Commission for the Los Angeles Rail Station Lightboxes, 2005

Coming and Going is a work of seven images conceived specifically for the lightboxes installed in the Los Angeles Metro Rail Stations. The seven images create a doubled view of a California white pine, turned on its side, and pointing in towards the center from each end. The two images of the tree have been broken up and reassembled over the course of three lightboxes each. The center panel has no detail, just sky.

Coming and Going is part of a larger body of work that addresses environmental concerns by examining the structure of our relationship to the environment. This piece is a reference to this relationship, one where our perception of nature is broken up and reassembled according to our concerns. Nature has become that which exists between manmade things; columns, buildings, roads, ciites. Coming and Going emphasizes this relationship to nature by asking the viewers to recognize the disjunctions in the images, and reassemble them as they see fit.

Coming and Going gains strength through the odd placement of highly detailed, brilliant tall trees brought underground. The work uses the long draw of the passageway for its composition, and the trees reflect the bi-directionality of the viewers' movement and orientation. The work is both analogous to the viewers' activity, and contrary to their place.

Coming and going as installed at Hollywood/Highland Station, Los Angeles, California