The Water and The Sower

Mixed media installation. 2020.
Variable dimensions. Physical installation and multi-webcam 24/7 live stream.

Collaboration with Cristina Planas / Espace Brutalle. Concept, exhibition design: Cristina Planas + Adam Basanta

End Of Summer 01.Inflatable watermelon pool toy, wheatgrass, corn, grow light, plastic, metal, hemp, water, nutrients, timer, LED neon strip.



The Water and The Sower is a temporary exhibition, existing both as a physical space and 24/7 multiple-webcam live stream. The exhibited works grow, die, and are re-arranged on camera during the exhibition period.

I’m compelled to make sculptural work that is reconfigurable. Change is in the air wherever you look, and I’m trying to use that to pay extreme attention to the present moment rather than permanence. Simply, planning ahead for an imagined eternity makes no sense at the moment for any one of us.

Traditionally, the value of sculpture is relative to its ability to stay in fixed permanence, a desire for a mark to remain beyond us. We’ve all read Ozymandias, we know this is an illusion and equally we persist as it seems to me to be an irrepressible force.

In these reconfigurable works, instead of relating value to permanence of a “finished piece”, I try to prioritize the value of the process of making, free of a desirable end-state. Because the activity of working with material freely and exercising the creative muscle in routine intervals releases endorphins. Because if the hands can stay busy, the mind is free to float in the thick moment of the present, without projecting itself into an anxious future or romanticized past.

Canister Variations. Modular sculpture, re-arranged daily. Water canisters, dyed water, ratchet strap, plumbing valve, plastic duct, rubber, metal fasteners, sponges, various found materials (glass sheet, wine glass, mirror, mop, fluorescent bulbs).

Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

Line Trace. Clawfoot bathtub, scavenged plant, LED Neon strip, zip ties.

Fixture 02. Scavenged fluorescent light fixture, grow lights, speckled peas, hemp, water, nutrients, plastic bottle, electrical wire, timer.

Fixture 02. Detail (flowering).

v Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

Water Cycle. Water bottles, cannisters, dyed water, water pump.

Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

Canister Variations. Daily re-arrangment.

End Of Summer 02.Bucket, inflatable orange pool toy, arugula, light bulb, plastic, metal, hemp, water, nutrients, timer, scavanged cable protectors.

The Gates, They Are Near

Performance / video. Two bubble guns, glycerine, soap, water.

Photos by Adam Basanta.