Her Ocean Floor is a series of cast paper sculptures.
I began this work a few months after my father died. The title draws on the pioneering work of Marie Tharp, the oceanographer who first charted the ocean floor. Collaging together rubber molds of my lover’s body, I explored her sensuous folds, topologies of hidden places, as a way of feeling into the erotic pulse of life and death that is always there, in the synaptic spaces between all we think we know about ourselves and the world, and that comes into relief through grief’s touch. Grief doesn't just touch everything but is itself touching, is a form of touch, and changes how we touch and are touched by the world. These works are about that touch, the deep dark depths that are beyond our knowing but that shape our lives, our fears and desires.
By combining parts of the body with blue and brown tones to suggest oceanic topographies, this body of work draws tensions between what can be mapped, and what must be sensed through wilder forms of knowing.
This is an ongoing series (2025—).
topology i, 2025. 21"x14"x3"
cast cotton paper with archival pigments and botanical dyes
inquiries: studio.kristadragomer@gmail.com
topology ii, 2025. 12"x20"x2"
topology iii, 2025. 14"x16"x2"
topology iv, 2025, 20”x 17”x3”