Google 65 Roses, 2011
What we celebrate today, we throw away tomorrow.
Google 65 Roses is a faux-temple to the fluctuation of emotion and persistence that it requires to live with a degenerative genetic disease (and life itself being degenerative). I wanted to disrupt the positivity imbued on objects such as balloons and roses, to instead celebrate their temporality. Using objects loaded with emotion, I can call into question what we are actually celebrating and honoring and bring to light issues of pain, suffering and loss that seem to be alter egos to pleasure and happiness. Over time this temple, once “pristine,” will degenerate into a pathetic version of itself and a collection of new meanings can present themselves. Those new meanings are beautiful and celebratory.
*The piece extends if/when the viewer literally Googles “65 Roses.”