Mona Lisa
January 2025–April 2025
California antique verde marble, Washington State, brucite base
Mona Lisa: While diving in California’s Channel Islands, I was once eyeballed by very large, gentle, Snoopy-like fish turning, lazy circles, while trying to determine what I was, and what I was doing. These big, lumbering ocean sunfish (Mola mola) are about the size of a Volkswagen (6,000+ lbs.), and not particularly attractive or graceful; however, it occurred to me that the parents (as well as the offspring) of this fish probably consider it to be the most beautiful, and valuable of all nature’s creations. Since Leonardo’s iconic painting is arguably the world’s most valuable commodity, I chose the name “Mona Lisa,” to represent this animal who, to the hierarchy and “lowerarchy” of the species, is probably their most beautiful, and treasured, and loved, “commodity.”
California antique verde, Mona Lisa sculpture
12 x 10 x 30”
131 lbs
Washington State / British Columbia, brucite base
7½ x 14 x 9”
61 lbs