The Work.

01

I Refused the Parking Validation 2011

Artist, one (1) un-validated parking stub, the long walk to the elevator, ambient fluorescent hum · Duration variable (approx. 4 hours)

For one afternoon I stood at the validation kiosk and I refused. They offered me the stamp – free egress, the comfort, the convenience – and I refused, as an artist and, frankly, as a man. The work is the cost. The fee accrued in real time, a small grief lit from below, until the meter became, essentially, a religious experience. People asked what it meant. I told them the Tiger does not validate. Do you see. They never see.

Performance Destroyed by intention

02

Chafing Dish (A Confession) 2013

Hotel chafing dish, Sterno flame, one congealing scrambled egg, gold leaf, plinth · Dimensions variable

The buffet at the Aurelio is not a buffet. It is a confession, lit from below, and I have spent my mature period saying so to a public that wanted only the breakfast. Here a single chafing dish carries the vibration of every grief ever steamed beneath a heat lamp. I gilded the lid because, frankly, gold leaf is a form of truth-telling. The egg never sets. That, on a cellular level, is the point. I don't expect you to understand.

Installation Private collection

03

The Tiger Turned Away (Self-Portrait as Vibration) 2016

Mirror, single tiger whisker (provenance withheld), Vegas-Strip dust, Applied Sincerity, artist's breath · Dimensions variable

I made this in the marrow of my worst season, the season the Tiger turned away. You will see a mirror. You will see yourself, and behind you the faint shimmer where the work refuses to resolve. That shimmer is the vibration, or its absence – I have never been able to say which, and the not-saying is load-bearing. A whisker rests at the base. I will not tell you whose. Some collaborators are owed silence. Do you see. There is free parking after six.

Mixed Media Not for sale

04

Everything, And I Mean It 2021

Seven hundred objects (acquired, found, refused by others), chandelier, gold leaf, more gold leaf, the moral stance of maximalism · Dimensions variable (room-filling)

This is the thesis of my late period and, frankly, the unifying theory of Sincere Maximalism made flesh. Seven hundred objects, each one necessary, because more is the only honest amount and the chandelier is the natural endpoint of all human striving. They called it cluttered. The discourse was not ready. I did not choose to include everything – the work demanded it of me, on a cellular level, until restraint itself felt like a kind of lie. I refused the lie. I always refuse the lie.

Installation Ongoing

05

Sandwich (A Thesis) 2010

One club sandwich, frilled toothpick, certificate of authenticity, the audacity of meaning it · 12 x 12 x 9 cm

Before the movements had names, before the discourse, there was the sandwich. I ate it slowly, as an artist and, frankly, as a man, and I understood that a club sandwich is not lunch but an argument about mortality stacked in three tiers and pinned with a tiny flag. I issued a certificate. I ate the evidence. What remains is the claim, which is, essentially, a religious experience. People ask if it was just a sandwich. It was never just a sandwich. Do you see.

Conceptual Destroyed by intention

06

Heat Shimmer No. 4 (Parking Lot at Noon) 2018

Field recording of an empty asphalt lot at high noon, looped, the spiritual authority of distance, mirage rendered audible · Duration variable (loop, 11 min)

Post-Desert Luminism taught me that light has a sound and the parking lot has a soul, and at noon the two become indistinguishable. I recorded nothing and I recorded everything – the shimmer, the held breath of the asphalt, the vibration of pure distance. Visitors say they hear heat. That is correct. That is, frankly, the entire achievement. The mirage is a medium and I am, as far as I am aware, its only living practitioner. We were three, once. Now the loop plays alone. Do you see.

Sound POA

07

The Grief That Pretends to Be a Fountain 2019

Tiered cherub fountain, recirculating water, dyed sorrow-blue, submerged pump, gold-leaf basin · Dimensions variable

It is not a fountain. It is a grief that has learned to circulate, that has taught itself the choreography of cheerfulness so the lobby will accept it. I built it in the marrow of a difficult winter and dyed the water the precise blue of a feeling I cannot name and will not try to. The cherubs weep, but politely, on a loop, forever. People throw coins. The coins, too, are part of the work now. I refused to stop them. Do you see.

Installation Private collection

08

Vibrational Crossing (Movement Study in One Traffic Light) 2014

Artist's body, one pedestrian crossing, the color of a traffic light experienced as scripture, gesture · Duration variable

I crossed the same intersection for nine hours and I let the light move me – red, refusal; green, release; the amber an unbearable in-between that is, essentially, a religious experience. This is movement freed from dance, which is to say movement that has finally remembered what it is for. The cars carried the vibration or they lacked it. Mostly they honked. The discourse called it loitering. The discourse was not ready, and frankly the discourse rarely is. Do you see.

Movement Not for sale

09

Napkin (Peer to the Ceiling) 2009

Cocktail napkin, ballpoint ink, cocktail ring stain, archival vitrine, the conviction of equivalence · 13 x 13 cm

I sketched this in four seconds on a damp cocktail napkin and I hold, without apology, that it is the peer of the great frescoed ceilings of the old masters – not their lesser, not their echo, their peer. Greatness is not a function of square footage. The masters had scaffolding and a patron. I had a ballpoint and the Tiger's attention, which is, frankly, the harder commission. The ring stain is original and intentional. I refused to blot it. To blot it would have been a lie. Do you see.

Mixed Media POA

10

Hummus, Reconsidered (As an Artist and, Frankly, As a Man) 2017

Wall text only, no hummus, the absence of hummus, certificate, white wall · Dimensions variable

There is no hummus. There was never going to be hummus. The work is the reconsideration itself, conducted in public, in which I weigh the chickpea against eternity and find, frankly, that both are heavier than they appear. I removed the object so that nothing would stand between the visitor and the thought. Some called it an empty room. They lack the vibration. An empty room is the most furnished room there is, if you bring the marrow. I don't expect you to understand – and that's the point.

Conceptual Not for sale

11

Applied Sincerity (Manifesto in Forty-One Coats of Lacquer) 2015

Wood panel, forty-one coats of clear lacquer over a single handwritten word, gold leaf edge · 80 x 60 cm

Beneath forty-one coats of lacquer there is one word, written by me, in earnest, which is the most dangerous thing a person can do in this century. I will not tell you the word. The depth is the meaning – sincerity buried so far it becomes architecture, light entering and never quite returning, which is, essentially, a religious experience. In an age of irony I have made earnestness the avant-garde. I invented caring, or rediscovered it, and the distinction, frankly, does not interest me. Do you see.

Mixed Media Private collection

12

Chandelier Descending (The Natural Endpoint of All Human Striving) 2022

Crystal chandelier suspended at floor level, gold chain, dust of the Strip, the moral stance of more · Dimensions variable

I lowered the chandelier until it rested on the floor, because the ceiling had become, frankly, a form of cowardice. Striving ascends; I asked it instead to arrive. Here is the endpoint, glittering, grounded, refusing the flattery of height. Neo-Vegas Baroque holds that ornament is a moral stance, and a chandelier you can touch is the most moral object I have ever made. Visitors kneel without being told. I did not tell them. The work told them. Do you see. There is, I should add, free parking after six.

Installation POA

13

The Discourse Was Not Ready 2020

Artist reading aloud from blank pages to an empty room, folding chairs, a podium, ninety minutes of conviction · Duration variable (90 min)

I delivered the lecture to a room of empty folding chairs because the discourse, as ever, was not ready, and I refused to wait for it to arrive before saying what the work required. The pages were blank. I read them anyway, in the marrow, with total conviction, for ninety minutes. Emptiness is not absence – emptiness is an audience that has not yet been born. They will catch up. They always, eventually, do not. Do you see. I forgive them. That, too, is the work.

Performance Destroyed by intention

14

Post-Desert Luminism No. 7 (Mirage Holding a Receipt) 2025

Heat-warped acrylic, a single faded parking receipt, gold leaf, desert light captured and refusing to leave · 100 x 70 cm

This is my most recent work and, frankly, my most distilled – everything I know about light, distance, and the spiritual authority of the parking lot, fused into a single warped pane that holds one faded receipt the way a reliquary holds a saint. The mirage does not lie. The mirage is the only honest thing the desert ever made. I gilded the edge because the truth deserves a border. The receipt is real. The fee was, essentially, a religious experience. I don't expect you to understand – and that's the point.

Mixed Media Ongoing