the sun never sets

High-density polyethylene and PVC sheet¹, black acrylic², pine³, colored acrylic⁴, drywall screws⁵, sheet metal screws⁶, burnt wood⁷, brass screws⁸, epoxy resin⁹, walnut¹⁰, corrugated plastic¹¹, climbing rope¹², lead¹³, enamel¹⁴, denim¹⁵, steel rings¹⁶, hot-pink masonry line¹⁷, buffalo horn and acrylic pen blanks¹⁸

76in. x 48in. x 60in.
2008

^1. Retrieved after hours from the Trident Plastics dumpster after the good old boy owner told me I could hit it up because he “thought I was alright” but not to tell anyone else.
^2. Cannibalized from an older piece that I reluctantly threw away but saved parts of in an effort to salvage some value from its expense.
^3. From the perfectly usable scrap that the VCU AFO students left behind, for which I feel both resentful of and responsible for, as I’d like to think I taught them better than that.
^4. Scraps bought at a discount from the nice lady at D&G Plastics that she had initially ordered for Arthur but he hadn’t purchased all of which she seemed slightly put off about.
^5. Admittedly bought from Lowe’s.
^6. Bought from Pleasants, which I feel less guilty about because it’s more of an old-school southern hardware store.
^7. From a house next door that was the site of a murder/arson in the 90’s that was graciously loaded into my truck in the middle of the night by the renovators who would suspiciously only work from midnight to 5am.
^8. Salvaged from the VDOT warehouse liquidation.
^9. Given to me as a gift for helping a stressed and departing Arthur quickly move his studio and house into a cramped POD after he realized he was being optimistic with how many of his belongings he could actually keep.
^10. Left in the studio from the previous tenant, a furniture designer who’s name I think was Jesse and who’s extensive use of walnut ended up covering every single square foot of that place with at least a quarter inch of toxic dust.
^11. Saved after demolishing Kerry’s jerry-rigged office that was also left in the studio, a large structure that I was proud of being able to totally disassemble myself in the span of only a few hours.
^12. From Ms. Walters high school “Rocks and Ropes” course.
^13. From fishing sinkers found in a coffee can in the Model Tobacco warehouse that we were recruited to help clean it out.
^14. Purchased on three separate occasions while the Art Market was going out of business and eventually bought the last and conceivably most expensive batch when it was down to 70% off and felt like a vulture picking over an art supply carcass, but knew I would never be able to afford one-shot any other way and regardless I had a good rapport with the owner who generally seemed to hate most people under fifty.
^15. Pieces from the dozen or so pairs of jeans my mother buys for me every year because she questions my sartorial decisions and yet I can’t bear to throw them away or even to give them to Goodwill because of the good intentions behind them.
^16. Salvaged from a set of antique 19th century leg-irons (which is an unsettling thing to come across in the south) that I found at a flea market in the boonies and initially intended for use in an ultimately failed video piece involving a pick axe and grave digging, but the current use of which in this later piece brought me a good degree of pleasure even though I still haven’t found a use for the actual chain that the rings were attached to.
^17. Snagged by Macon for me from her miserable job because she thought the color looked like something I could use.
^18. Inherited from my grandfather’s retirement pen-lathing hobby.