Oliver's Whale

A special edition giclée print. Original
shown here, Part of the Borderless map series created in quarantine during the COVID-19 pandemic, these maps are a process of looking at the world through the eyes of a virus where borders are a man-made construct that have no effect on containing the spread of a global virus. This whole series re-imagines a world where we can stitch our hearts back together with compassion and realize our greatest strength in our collective empathy.

'Oliver's Whale' is inspired by Mary's Oliver's poem that I've spray painted on sidewalks in multiple cities using the same stencil used to spray paint this map of Croatia's coastal islands. Now this map is re-imagined with maps from Ireland, BOrneo, Breckenridge, Moab, Zamiba, Germany, and France with wildlife migration maps from Yellowstone, whale migration data, and our constellations partially burning, Corona Borealis visible right beside the whale's tail. All stitched together with gold leaf and the additional words of Nikita Gill, Rudyard Kipling, and Sarah Kay. I do not want to return to 'normal', the world was already burning before this current pandemic. I want the world to realize that the world was already broken, but if the world has been able to rebuild after the horrors of WWII, if France rebuilt itself into a more just country after the French Revolution tore it apart, if the world survived the Black Plague, the Spanish Flu, then we will 'get through' this... but howabout we work to create something better as we rebuild? 'Back to normal' isn't good enough. We can dream bigger than that!

These are special edition prints from the originals. Sized 24x36 inches. The gold leaf is hand embellished to each print after printing and signed and dated from quarantine in Frisco, Colorado in May, 2020.