The PeaceWorks Project

Like millions around the world I was heartbroken by the events at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.  As the parent of two daughters, it still seems unimaginable that such a thing could have happened.  I was also very moved by President Obama's declaration that "meaningful action" is needed.  And while his comments were directed at the political arena, I believe we all should acknowledge this tragic loss with meaningful action.  For me, that means creating art.  More specifically, that means creating PeaceWorks.

A PeaceWork is a piece of public sculpture designed to encourage gun awareness.  I choose to leave the politics of gun control out of the mix.  I simply want to stimulate thought.  And I want my work to continue to stimulate thought long after the immediate horror of Newtown has passed.

Remember making snowmen as a kid?  You first made a snowball with your hands, then rolled it around the yard, patting the snow down tight, until it was the size of a beach-ball.  Then you made another one.  And so on.  PeaceWorks are much the same thing, except that instead of snow they are made from the disabled Colts, Glocks, Smith & Wessons, Bushmasters, AK-47s and other assorted weaponry obtained from local police departments.  The result is a large spherical sculpture made out of disabled guns and sealed with polymer resin.  A PeaceWork.

On a regular basis, every police department in the country disposes of confiscated firearms that are no longer useful as evidence.  Usually they are transferred to a contractor which then melts them down and recycles the raw materials for other purposes.  The PeaceWork Project will replace smelting as a more societally productive way of recycling the firearms.  Each weapon will be both physically disabled (using, among other things, a 5-pound sledge and a cold chisel) and further rendered useless by filling its chamber with the same polymer resin that is then used to attach the gun to the sculpture.  And the PeaceWork, just like a snowball, keeps getting bigger and bigger as guns are added.

I've embarked on the process of making the first PeaceWork in my home town -- Troy, New York.  It may not work -- there are always bureaucratic and political challenges to projects like this.  But if not Troy, then someplace else.  Again and again.  Because the goal of the PeaceWork Project is to pepper the country with PeaceWorks.  Some big, some small, but each with the same purpose:  to catch the eye, and the mind, of a passerby and make him or her think, if only for a moment, about what the American experience should or shouldn't be.

That, to my mind, is the purpose of art.  And that, to my mind, is meaningful action.