Aver

Year Completed: 2024

Medium: Relief/Reduction

Size: 15.875in × 10.875in

The octopus and the stoplight act as central symbols, weaving a narrative about the fluidity of time, change, and decision-making. The stoplight, often viewed as a mundane traffic signal, here represents life’s pauses, shifts, and transitions—red for stop, green for go, yellow for hesitation. These colors reflect the choices we make daily, the moments of stillness, movement, and uncertainty. Yet, time flows through it all, indifferent to our decisions, like the mechanical rhythm of the stoplight.

The octopus, with its fluid limbs, moves in all directions at once. It symbolizes adaptability and the often chaotic nature of navigating life’s constant changes. Like the octopus stretching its tentacles in unpredictable ways, we grasp at opportunities, some within our reach, others slipping away into the tide of time. Its form and movement evoke the sense of being pulled in multiple directions by the currents of life and the inevitable passage of time.

Coins, tossed into the air, reflect the unpredictability of the choices we face. They spin in the air, like fleeting chances or wishes cast into an unknown future, echoing the idea that change is both constant and random—like the flip of a coin. New eras emerge and fade as quickly as a coin lands heads or tails, representing the duality of endings and beginnings.

This piece embodies the tension between control and surrender, the ceaseless movement of time, and our ongoing dance with change. It asks the viewer to reflect on the symbolic intersections of life’s crossroads, moments of chance, and the fluidity of the future that always moves beyond our grasp, like the octopus slipping into the depths.