Leaders, Dreamers & Rebels 

A Commission by the LA Times for the LA Festival of Books 

Leaders, Dreamers & Rebels was a commissioned piece by the Los Angeles Times for the LA Times Festival of Books held at the University of Southern California's campus in April, 2014. I was asked to do a sculpture over 2 days time. I decided to really challenge myself and make a 10-foot spiraling book sculpture. I really wanted to not only make this an amazing still action sculpture, i really wanted to capture the feeling of the event and also to make it a performance art piece as well. I had a drill press set up with mounds of old books surrounding it and was drilling holes in these books and threading them onto the metal support system of the main structure. Most of the books i was using were to be "pulped" or ripped apart for mulch or recycling. You can see what pulping is HERE. It's pretty gruesome for a book lover. I got an amazing amount of interaction and feedback from the crowd. People felt strongly and responded in a myriad of ways not only to the book drilling but also to the whimsical nature of the sculpture as well. Interestingly enough, i had an incredibly supportive response from librarians and professors. They offered up their excess books for me to use on future projects and absolutely was taken by the idea. Leaders, Dreamers and Rebels is currently on display at the La Pintoresca Library in Pasadena.