Artist Statement

In sculptures and installations, I use cast human body parts in combination with the forms of other-than-humans. Each mélange repositions the human as one component of an ecosystem, giving and receiving in acts of radical collaboration with companion species. I utilize subdued color palettes and a range of materials, wherein the natural properties of each physical component have presence and identity, allowing for them to participate in the meaning of the work. In conversation with one another, the materials begin to embody the complexity and cooperative nature of an ecosystem. The large scale and physicality of my sculptures are reflections of my own body and the way it moves through space.

Oddkin creates a site to process, grieve, and contend with the reality of ecological degradation across the globe, and the major extinction event that we are now experiencing. It opens a conversation about how material technology has shaped our environment since the emergence of human culture and how it has altered our relationships to all other living beings. The materials I employ–clay, cast metal, wood, and plaster–speak to that history and collapse it into a rich present.

The concept that there is a limitless and pristine resource called “nature” which exists outside the human world allows the global capitalist-imperialist system to flourish, compelling societies to exploit and consume to the point of genocide and environmental collapse. Eschewing the concept of an externalized nature and challenging humanistic associations with motherhood, my work highlights kinship with other forms of life.

I dedicate this body of work to Poppy and Gry, my grandparents and dearest friends, who were responsible for planting the seeds of curiosity in my chest and the stone in my spine. Although you have both joined the realm of the ancestors, I will continue to carry with me your insatiable appetite for learning, your dedication to community (both human and other-than-human), and your love of wild places. I am so grateful to have known you.