It’s an honor to have Columbia Basalt Column included in Auburn Washington’s Downtown Sculpture Gallery. This is on display and on sale for 1 year at 10 East Main Street. Help me win the People’s Choice award by voting for #7 online. Run it up!

This is a tribute to the Columbia River Gorge in the PNW where I call home. I created this to honor the rocky cliffs I’ve admired in the area. Lava flows spilled for hundreds of miles toward the Pacific Ocean from eastern Oregon, Washington and Idaho. It took over 1.1 million years with over 300 flows to build up over 6000 feet thick! The mighty Columbia River carved its way west through this basalt on its way to the same ocean. As lava cools into rock it creates columnar jointing patterns based on its mineral composition. This sculpture is an abstract representation of this distinct Columbia River Basalt. In basalt there are strong angles, planes and facets. Through reclaimed steel I simplified these characteristics into a striking statement. 

Working with glass artist, James Scott Stephenson, we created a glass accent for the front of the column. We focused on warm colors that best express the heat of lava. The fiery glass sits like a porthole or a lens that looks inside and tells the story of the origin of the rock. Imagine the heat of the lava flows that created the basalt of the Columbia River Gorge! 

The Vitrigraph process results in a multicolor collection of circles. I play off this spotted appearance by also incorporating perforated steel throughout the sculpture which lets in light through the openings.