Badwater is a complex installation of objects, materials and processes that create an abiotic ecosystem, a network of non-living things that, while inanimate, continue to exert their material agency. In a time when extreme weather conditions have become a reality around the world and in California in particular, Badwater uses a climate controlling infrastructure to create an accelerated cycle of flood and drought. Inspired by the saltwater spring in Death Valley’s Badwater Basin, and the resilient ecosystem around it that has evolved to withstand these harsh conditions, Lamson’s piece is a generative work that brings these quiet geologic forces into the gallery and allows them to develop over the two month duration of the show.

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