Tunnelled Time

Tunnelled Time 2018

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Art Proposal for the Whimsical Garden in Lions Park, for the City of Port Coquitlam in collaboration with Pippa Lattey, 

Credit: models were made by Pippa Lattey

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Tunneled Time encourages visitors to consider the time scales of plants and decay: stretching unseen both into the past and future. There are vast worlds hidden, like ants nests, with their underground passages twisting and leading through a megalopolis that is inconceivable to our human minds. Tunneled Time recognizes these worlds exist, and responds with respect and awe. A decomposing log stands upright, while another rests on its side; both are clad in lush growth: ferns, fungus, and wet green moss. They are surrounded by whimsical stainless steel forms, lines that reach out of the earth in twists and turns, with bulbous deposits along their upward paths. A well trodden pathway leads around the pieces, nestled among familiar low-lying indigenous plants. The abstract bulbs inspire the imagination to think of things indeterminate; they may develop into shapes that are reminiscent of archeological digs, fossils, or curiosities found when digging in the garden.

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This sculpture encourages viewers of all ages to look up and imagine

downward what non-human life can tell us about curiosity, playfulness, and surprise.

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Tunneled Time integrates itself with and supports the ecology of the park through the use of indigenous plants. All forms of life can interact with this structure: it can be a source of food, or a home for insects, or a resting perch for birds. The steel forms will glint in the sun, bead with water in the rain, and constantly exist in harmony and contrast with the ongoing growth and decay around and underneath them.

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