Data Mountains is a large sculpture made with tree branches and sticks that have been collected from the DFW area. I began in early December and will continue until the end of February for my MFA Thesis, “Legend Systems: an escape to a hidden land,” May 2021.

Here are some images of progress so far. I go to a residential neighborhood, I collect the sticks, I weave them together to form bundles. I also use a GPS application to track my route so that I know where each bundle came from. I usually take photos of the neighborhood if I see anything that catches my eye. I have been thinking that I should record sound. I will do that next time.

I organized it by neighborhood. These are photos that I took while out collecting sticks. They are quick snapshots.

Here is my very first day. A pipe or something broke and was spilling water on the street. It was bringing with it the red soil under the street asphalt. Denton-1-12-6-2020

Flower Mound-1-12-8-2020

McKinney-1-12-13-2020

Southlake-1-12-16-2020

Plano-1-12-22-2020

Fort Worth-1-1-5-2021

Denton-2-1-13-2021

Dallas-1-1-19-2021

Fort Worth-2-1-26-2021

Grapevine-1-2-03-2021

Arlington-1-2-4-2021

UNT-1-2-11-2021

On 2-17-2021, I took a snow day. Here in Texas, we had a historic snow accumulation and related disasters that made it impossible for me to drive anywhere. So, I stayed home and tracked myself for 4 hours. This is the map of how much I moved around the house. It was cold so I didn’t really move much from the couch.

Along with the above map, I made a map for each day that I walked in each neighborhood.

Here are some photos from the sculpture I am making with the sticks collected.