I only received one gift at graduation: a pair of scissors.

My brothers and I were raised in Appalachia, a region that was once the western border of the United States, satirized as “red neck,” and anthropologically documented in the FoxFire chronicles. In 1964, it became the site for President Lyndon B. Johnson’s war on poverty. We grew up in Montgomery County, home to one of the state's land grant universities, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, known more commonly and simply as Virginia Tech. The local community was a strange blend of the highly-educated and backwoods moonshiners.

In the 80's, my parents were active members of Virginia Tech's cave club, so we were raised in outdoor, high-adventure sports; I was on skis and backpacking by the age of 3. To go underground is to go into another world where specific skillsets are necessary in order to be successful: you have to be comfortable crawling through mud, swimming in 55 degree water...and you really have to know your knots. A favorite and illustrative anecdote is about the carbide lamps that were our primary sources of light underground; these are the old miner’s lamps which use a mineral combined with water to produce an acetylene flame. Because we relied on these lamps in the pitch dark, we regularly practiced cleaning and rebuilding them blindfolded. A few years later, our parents enlisted our burgeoning skills to help build the addition on our childhood home—which was one hell of an introduction to tools and construction! We learned skills which we further employed in the building of tree houses and castle turrets, and by the time I was fourteen, the three of us boys had reroofed the house.

In hindsight, it's easy to see how I became a sculptor. Backpacking and caving in surreal landscapes provides experiences of corporeal wonder that are even more magical because they're shared. Leveraging my building skills in the arena of large-scale sculpture allows me to recreate some of these remote environments for urban sites where they're accessible to more people. The first 12 years of my practice were defined by my participation in multiple educational facilities spread out across the country. My time was spent in a variety of studios, apprenticeships, residencies, and workshops, on a wide array of projects. In 2014, I received my MFA from Arizona State University. True to my family's DIY ethos and reverence for good tools, I only received one gift for graduation: a pair of scissors.

This tool became my constant traveling companion for the next few months over the course of creating my first major public art commission. As an uprooted, recent graduate, "Shifting Sand Land" was built in 5 studios across 4 states before debuting back in Arizona. Named after a desert level in the video game world of Super Mario Brothers, this artwork is an all-ages version of the classic game, “Can’t Touch the Ground.” It's designed as a series of small platforms with hemispherical foundations. These “islands” constantly change a person’s center of gravity—keeping participants on their toes!

Each module is constructed with a steel shell, filled with water. This water acts as a counterweight, slowing down the movement and adding to the physical disorientation. Attached to the shell is a wooden deck and a colorful, upholstered bumper; the bumper making sure no one scrapes a shin or bumps a knee. Juxtaposing materials in this way levels the hierarchy of tools; here, my humble scissors were just as important as my welding gun, each tool to its task. The overall composition includes 25 modules ranging in scale from 18 inches to 6 feet. The larger islands allow several people to interact with each other, sort of like those old, 4-person seesaws, creating a more dynamic form of play. And much like the landforms through caves and canyons, collectively the modules of "Shifting Sand Land" form an archipelago, an alien landscape ripe for exploration; the magic really happens when children begin to show their parents how to interact with it! During its 3 days at the Scottsdale Arts Festival, over 1,25o people leapt, toppled, laughed and played across "Shifting Sand Land".

Not only a signifier of a major academic achievement, my "graduation scissors" marked and contributed to the success of my first large public art project, earning their place as a trusted staple in my arsenal. Continuing in this discipline, I hope to demonstrate the power of individuals to shape their world. With simple materials—and the right tools—anyone can create changes of dramatic impact and imagination in the built-environment.