project for the Globe Elevator

 

In early 2009 I discovered that plans were under way to dismantle the massive Globe Elevator in Superior, Wisconsin, a structure of great personal and conceptual interest to me. I subsequently wrote for a grant through the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs at the University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire where I was awarded the opportunity to develop what has become an ongoing project. Below is a portion of that text:

In (Project for the Globe Elevator), I account for the scope of American civilization, its productive past and how it has been spelled-out across our physical and cultural landscape. By using of a form of portraiture, I intend to distill our shared cultural heritage down to archetypal imagery as signifiers of the distinctly American character that has so changed the world. The model for this portrait will be the last-of-its-kind wooden Globe Elevator, which is currently being dismantled at St. Louis Bay in Superior, Wisconsin. The metaphor is a poignant one: an icon of the industrial age, it stood for 125 years as a funnel for the riches of a continent in full bloom, a temple to ravenous exuberance and the concept of endless growth. It required an entire forest for its construction, and over the course of a century disgorged itself of tens-of-millions of bushels of wheat for waiting world-markets. Today, as it is scavenged for its virgin timber and heavy metals, it is emblematic of market decline and post-productive anxiety.