Olive wood (Olea europaea) with stainless steel and epoxy inlays.
14 lbs. 25” × 18” × 3”
Resting precariously on a single vertical steel rod, the olive wood burl evokes a destabilized scale of justice—an instrument designed for balance, now held in suspension. The steel post functions as both fulcrum and constraint, suggesting the formal structures of law that promise objectivity while quietly determining where weight is allowed to fall.
The burl’s dense, irregular mass resists symmetry. Its natural growth patterns—knots, voids, and compressed grain—register accumulation over time rather than equilibrium. In contrast, the steel rod is precise, linear, and indifferent, a rigid axis against which organic complexity is measured but never resolved.
Burden of Proof gives sculptural form to a foundational legal principle: the obligation to carry weight in order to be believed. Here, that burden is neither evenly distributed nor stable. Instead, it is borne by a living material forced into dialogue with an abstract system, revealing how judgment often rests not on balance, but on where pressure is applied—and by whom.
The work invites the viewer to consider whether justice is truly balanced, or merely engineered to appear so.
Olive wood (Olea europaea) with stainless steel and epoxy inlays.
14 lbs. 25” × 18” × 3”
Resting precariously on a single vertical steel rod, the olive wood burl evokes a destabilized scale of justice—an instrument designed for balance, now held in suspension. The steel post functions as both fulcrum and constraint, suggesting the formal structures of law that promise objectivity while quietly determining where weight is allowed to fall.
The burl’s dense, irregular mass resists symmetry. Its natural growth patterns—knots, voids, and compressed grain—register accumulation over time rather than equilibrium. In contrast, the steel rod is precise, linear, and indifferent, a rigid axis against which organic complexity is measured but never resolved.
Burden of Proof gives sculptural form to a foundational legal principle: the obligation to carry weight in order to be believed. Here, that burden is neither evenly distributed nor stable. Instead, it is borne by a living material forced into dialogue with an abstract system, revealing how judgment often rests not on balance, but on where pressure is applied—and by whom.
The work invites the viewer to consider whether justice is truly balanced, or merely engineered to appear so.
