-
Kelly Akashi, Cultivator, 2022. Bronze, handblown glass, stainless steel, concrete, native plants, 80 x 72 x 48 inches. Museum purchase with funds provided by Kimberly and Patrick Lin. 2022.10. Photo by Benjamin Blackwell.
Ongoing Installation
This monumental bronze was cast from the artist’s own hand—complete with details of cuticles, fingernails, and creases—as a record of her slowly changing body. Rising from a planter filled with native plants, the hand’s fingers gently support an array of oversized glass-blown flowers modeled after endangered California species, including Presidio clarkia and threadleaf brodiaea. Within Akashi’s practice, the materials of bronze and glass are prized for their alchemical potential in shifting from liquid to solid states, a transformative possibility that resonates with the more visible changes to plants and human bodies over time. Materially and conceptually, Cultivator speaks to the intertwined, interdependent futures of humans and the world that surrounds us. It is a monument to intentional care and responsibility toward others, an entreaty to cultivate rather than destroy.
Support
Museum purchase with funds provided by Kimberly and Patrick Lin, 2022.10.
