Bicycle Lighting & Art
Lighted Clothing
Welded Jewelry & Accessories
Artistic Clothing
Glass Work
Custom Rainwear
Light as a medium is very much alive. By taking light and shining it on different materials, it makes those materials take shape. In my art, I take ground steel, glass, qwartz crystals, optical fibers, and shine lignt from light emitting diodes (LED's) in different directions. The light is reflected off in different patterns as the viewer looks at the object from different angles.
As a light artist, I feel that it is my obligation to allow only the light's interaction with the medium of the piece of art to show and not to let the source of light itself to show. Whether it be glass that is engraved; artfully ground stainless steel; or natural quartz crystals; I want to have the light appear to come from deep within the media and not from the LED itself.
Wearing a combination of artistic clothing constructed of unusual fabrics, along with light art jewelry enhances the experience of a special occasion, whether it be a formal dinner or going out on the town!
For those of you who live in the Portland, Oregon area; I do wear these out and about. The places that I commonly wear these pieces are at OMSI After Dark; Portland Gay Mens Chorus Concerts; events with the Radical Faeries; some events at the Q Center; as well as riding my art bike in the evening after dark.
A selection of my light art work was used by the hosts of a fund raising gala here
in Portland, Oregon. They are shown here
For those of you who have asked me on many occiasions as to when
I will start using animation or dynamic changing of colors, or why
I am not doing it now despite the availablity of the technology,
I have provided what I hope is adaquate explanation
here in this page
""The sign outside says 'Jacket and Tie Required'. Well, here I am.
And you still won't let me in???""
'Only kidding. But this is my only suit and tie that I now own. The bow tie came from a suggestion from a friend of mine to take something formal and create a piece of art out of it.
The bow tie is glass that is ground along the edges to accent the light. The center of it is a clear crystal rock.
The lights in the center of each bicycle sprocket are quartz crystals that are lit from below with LED's.
My childhood fascination with locks and keys, lights, electricity, and
simply being unusual gave me the inspiration for this cape.
Weighing close to 50 pounds, it is much too heavy to wear all the time. It is used only for very special occasions.
The brass locksets that you see on the cape I got from Hippo Hardware (Little did they know what I was going to do with them!). The clear plastic is 20 gauge thick. Thic lighs are fiber optics lit with high power LED's. The clothes that I am wearing under the cape are ones that I made for myself.
Watching the movie 'The Little Match Girl' once on Christmas (and crying
thereafter) inspired me to construct this piece of light art jewelry.
It expresses hope at shooting stars; there's a saying that
when you see a shooting star, it means that someone's soul
has ascended into heaven.
This piece was constructed using less than $2.00 in raw materials, some of which were found on the shoulder of Oregon Highway 26 in Beaverton while I was riding my bicycle 20 miles to and from work.
If you look carefully, you will see what appears to be green hills and sky. The hills were constructed of pieces of steel from an old door lock that the Rebuilding Center in Portland gave to me for next to nothing. The blue sky consists of knife blades from the 'bins' (The Goodwill Outlet Store in Millwalkie, Oregon). The two torch flames are pieces of quartz crystal lit from within by LED's.
In one of my childhood dreams from long ago, I was standing with
my family in fron of this large cathedral of light. We tried to
go inside.
We were stopped by a group of bullies from my school.
They told us that we were too poor to go inside this special place. We could only look at it from the outside.
I awoke from this dream crying.
Now, although those bullies never let me and my family inside; I wear this magical place with joy and pride at many events here in Portland. It is one of the lightest of all of my Light art jewelry and is easy to wear while riding my bicycle.
I wore this piece at the Basic Rights Oregon fund raiser gala. It was a hit.
Once upon a time, when I was a child, our family visited my grandparents home,
where I saw this fascinating lamp. It was a very old lamp that had crystals.
I wanted to turn it on and look at the crystals.
My mother told me that it did not work.
I cried.
For many years, when we visited grampa, I was sit there and look at that lamp, dreaming of magical light coming from those crystals.
This light art outfit is the result of my desire to make that dream a reality. The lights on my shirt are real leaded glass crystals that came off of lamps just like the one that grampa had during my childhood.
Wearable light art combines my fascination with light and my desire to shine at the world no matter the occasion.
I have worn this ensamble on a wide range of occasions including bicycle rides here in Portland, Oregon to formal $200.00 a plate fund raising parties.
This outfit has introduced many people to the ideas of light art and artistic clothing.
The blue, green, and black wook coat you see was done ad hoc using only a very rough pattern of a double brested trench coat.