Totems & Topographies

As both a visual artist and an architect of 20 years, Jessica Hogue uses innovative technology and data of personal significance to intertwine these two fields in her most recent body of work titled, Totems and Topographies. 

Hogue utilizes a unique process of combining her background in sculpture and a design method called parametric modeling to embed her materials and work with personal meaning. 

"In architecture school, I started using parametric 3D digital modeling as a form-finding tool. In parametric modeling, rules are set up to generate geometry using parameters, relationships, and constraints. I used this technique in school and in practice afterwards to design building masses and facades." Says Hogue.

Hogue began to see other potentials for this method to be expressive in similar ways to sculpture. Drawing inspiration from weather and moon phases, longitudes and latitudes of significant places, or even initials and dates relevant to people she loves, Hogue mines her personal life for data to apply to this technology, which results in organic patterns. Then, Hogue uses a CNC router to carve them out of plywood, a material she describes as "honest and uncelebrated."

The end result is a collection of beautiful objects reminiscent of totems or altars dedicated to the sacred that exists in our daily human experiences. Totems and Topographies can be viewed in the Gallery Annex through the month of September.