The Fulgur Series is grounded in Nature’s cycle of life and death and driven by the idea of “the understory,” or the underground aspects of phenomena and the rhizocentric metaphor in root systems.

This body of work takes the California LNU Lightning Complex wildfires, which occurred during the creation of these light sculptures in the Mojave Desert, as source of inspiration for material and conceptual explorations. 10,849 lightning strikes occurred within a 72-hour period in August of 2020, igniting 376 wildfires across the state, ultimately consuming 363,220 acres of land in the end.

The installation’s title references the rare phenomenon of fulgurites, derived from the Latin word fulgur meaning “lightning.” Sand fulgurites, often thought of as petrified lightning, are formed from cloud-to-ground discharges of atmospheric electricity caused by lightning strikes on sand beds, and produce an upgrowth of vertical glass tubes from the ground. That is to say, fulgurites are the preserved remains of a particular path of lightning and trace the shape of its unique bolt. Sand melts instantaneously when it reaches a temperature of 3,272°F, and a lightning bolt can produce temperatures upwards of 54,032°F. The energy of fulgurite-forming lightning strikes generally falls within 1 and 30 Megajoules per square metre of fulgurite produced, and contains heating rates of around 1,000 Kilometers per second. Depending on the thickness of the sand bed and the strength of the bolt, fulgurites can descend down into the ground as far as 50 feet, resembling a subterranean root system made of glass. In this sense, fulgurites, dwelling both above and below ground, serve as a communicating vessel between the Chthonic underworld and the Uranic celestial skies, linking the visible, physical, material, earthly plane of existence with the invisible, metaphysical, spiritual, sacred world beyond our knowing, rational understanding, and control.