ABANDON (2012)

Abandon is a hand-constructed mirror-filled box with a retractable scroll built into the lid and working lights built into its circuit board base. A series of tiny accordion books expand from the center surrounding a hand-built wire mesh shopping cart.

There is a poem printed on the scroll that the reader believes to be about an abandoned abused woman but in actuality she is just a shopping cart tipped over on the side of the road. My goal was to shed light, not only on the male or female aspect of inanimate objects but to human's attachment to these objects. This work directly addresses the cultural tendency to ignore the abuse of those less fortunate in our society, especially women.

The "viewer" pulls the scroll out, reads the poem and when they hit the end of the scroll, they read the line: “What kind of person feels sorry for a shopping cart?” and then the lid pops off to reveal a mass of shopping carts tipped over surrounded my mirror images of the viewer’s face—showing them their own part in the piece and hopefully getting them to take a look at their reaction to their attachment to objects and their compassion for others.

Abandon

I saw her there this morning.

Lying in the grass, legs spread

victimized and alone

unable to right herself.

Someone had taken her from her home

pushed her around, used her

and dumped her off here.

And the strangers just passed her by

all day, not thinking twice

just looking and walking away.

I admit that I did not help her

let her lie there all day, on her side

feet flailing in the wind and the traffic.

Kept looking through the window,

checking to see if anyone had

stood her up and taken her home.

They hadn’t.

What kind of person

feels sorry for

a shopping cart?