This small body of work is significant of my interest in the shared space between biological and mechanical systems. These etchings, produced off and on for one year - between 2008 and 2009 - are thumbnail sketches of various tractor engines and root systems, observed on a number of visits to county and state fairs, and on camping trips.

These prints are also an investigation of my interest in machines as isolated objects, and the sense in which they are extensions of organic bodies. I see these relationships both in my own print practice – the physical exertions of an analog studio, as well as my research – and also in the world of objects around me. Where contemporary industry and design hides the mechanical behind perfect interfaces, or discourages maintenance via hands-off plastic skins, I experience a relative attraction to the very human economy of an antique tractor or a steam-powered locomotive. Laid bare, the parts and movements of such epochal inventions are a quiet testament to the ingenuity of those that conceived them.

Many of these particular etchings were completed as seperate studies, and then paired on a single sheet of paper, using chine collé, if and when compositional similarites were observed.