Alina Rojo, 2021, This collaborative installation between Alina And Shelly McCoy for `Talking Threads', SOFAs botanical and sculpture garden is a site-specific, collaborative, and interactive series of four living sculptures that address environmental issues and the coexistence between people and nature.The public art living sculptures are made from repurposed garments such as a man’s jacket encased in
chicken wire, cement, and living vining, growing, harvested plants. A true blend of art and science offers
the viewer a chance to touch, play horticulturist by adding plants or watering the living art piece. The plants' mix such as Sphagnum moss, succulents, vines, and flowering plants are a vital part of the sculpture. The sculpture echoes a life-size human torso making the piece an aesthetic and metaphoric symbol of our ongoing connectedness to nature.
The internal structure of the sculpture is not visible to the viewer yet it echoes the same
interconnectedness to nature by having the plants growing on their outer surface as well as on their inside
surface. Over time the elements of nature will take over allowing the plants to become the dominant
feature of the sculpture, with the cemented sections sprouting with foliage through its intentional cracks,
referring to sidewalks that need to be weeded from time to time
The desired effect will have the sculpture blend into the surrounding gardens and become one with nature. The expressive nature of this work allows the viewer to appreciate nature from a unique perspective while provoking us to question our role in destroying it at the same time.
A collaborative installation between Shelly McCoy and
Alina Rodriguez-Rojo
Concrete and fibers (encased in a man's suit), 2021
Provenance, SOFA Museum, Palm Beach, Sculpture Garden