FLAXEN PASSAGE (DETAIL)

April 1994
The Art Institute of Chicago
10.5’ x 5’2” x 17.5’

A passageway constructed of wood and conduit with a curved ceiling of hand felted scuttched linen flax paper panels. Walls of hand woven linen with horizontal pockets held soil and flax seeds. A drip irrigation system watered the walls within which the flax sprouted under high intensity gas discharge lamps. A raised floor of flax seeds, covered over a reservoir within which two pumps recycled the water. An odor of growth and decay developed as the piece went through a three-week life cycle from germination to flourishing, then death.