This box is part of the Lovely and Amazing series. It is wrapped on the inside with surface treated laser print copies from Ruth’s scrapbook collection of handwritten poetry. The outside is wrapped with laser print copies of scans from a text and images about reptiles that have been tinted and coated with pigmented wax. Inside the box is a turtle shell. Suspended above the base is a wooden box that houses a turtle skull and magnifying lens. The top surface of that box has a photograph an inkjet reprint of black and white photograph of myself as a child watching a turtle stroll across Ruth’s back yard. Glazed with cast acrylic on front surface.

Lovely and Amazing, begun in 2006, is an ongoing series celebrating the life of Ruth Wheeler, beloved biology teacher, naturalist, youth advocate and feminist who lived and worked in north Denver for 70 years. Ruth found the natural world a place of endless delight and shared her enthusiasm with many, including myself, her great-niece. She left behind a collection of biological specimens, notes and photographs which I have incorporated into a series of three-dimensional collages, boxes and book works.

Materials:

Paper, laserprint, pigmented wax, birch plywood, brass, shell, carved horn, bone beads, steel tuning pins, steel rod, glass lens, red slider skull, (hardwood – specific species unknown), tempered hardboard, pine, acrylic and oil base paints, solid color print, mica, brass wire. Glazed with cast acrylic on front surface.