Flame Tempered

Ceramic Installation

Dimensions Variable (As Pictured: 6x8x12 feet)

2013

With quiet beauty and visual drama, Slugger transforms the everyday objects that were used as weapons in specific gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender and hate crime cases. Here I pay special attention to the baseball bat as an American symbol of masculinity, sport and in this case, violent object.

My large scale installation, Flame Tempered, is an organic configuration of over 70 ceramic baseball bats suspended in mid air. Illuminated with a single bare bulb casting long shadows through out the space, the work is an explosion of drama, perception and emotion. Peggy McGlone, art critic for The Star Ledger in Newark, NJ, recently described the piece as “at once beautiful and intimidating.”