My undergraduate thesis exhibition, sited in the lobby of the fine arts building and named for Picasso’s bombilla (“light bulb”/“little bomb”) embedded in an eye at the apex of Guernica, explored conflict, agency, and accountability at the intersection of natural and built. The installation brought students and visitors face to face with a topographical map of mountaintop removal coal mining and the patchwork turf used to obscure it. A reflection of my participation in fossil fuel divestment activism on campus, the installation expressed illumination and destruction, our intimate relationship between the private, dreamlike lamp and the public, nightmarish sources with which we power them.
The artwork intentionally sourced blemished sod from nearby Lincoln, Rhode Island, which otherwise would not have been sold by the farmer, and gifted the sod at the conclusion of the exhibition to the student-run garden's composting. The lightbulbs used were on temporary loan by a student group operating a light bulb exchange (CFLs in exchange for incandescents).