2025’s Summer personal project:
Build a big red ladder, put it out in the desert.
This art project came to me in a vision about 4 years ago and I was finally able to bring it to fruition over the summer of 2025 with my friend Cooper.
Like many of our past projects, the brief sounds simple, but the execution was a months-long process of learning, woodwork, compromises, hardware stores, and dedication.
Phase 2 was production. Cooper and I were new to woodworking, so we were mostly playing it by ear. We knew the parts we needed, we just needed to get the right wood and cut it to the right shapes. This is easier said than done when working with 13-foot 2by8 planks of lumber, but we had a vision and we weren’t going to back down.
We painted and finished the ladder in my backyard and we were ready to take it out to the desert.
The West Greenwich Dunes is the only desert in Rhode Island. Forty acres of sand dunes surrounded by forestland in West Greenwich. The area feels alien and out-of-place, which really inspired us to construct some kind of sculpture in its unique landscape.
The ladder was built in pieces that could be taken apart and reconstructed on location. Our friend Raj helped us transport the ladder in his pickup truck and lug the pieces into the desert.
