Indigo's Absence was a commission created for the Children's Discovery Museum in Chattanooga Tennessee. The form is loosely drawn from the rolling mountains surrounding Chattanooga. White denim was used to create a greater sense of contrast. 

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The American Chestnut was a dominant species in the North American forest until it was all but wiped out by a blight introduced in the late 1800s. Numbering nearly four billion, the tree was among the largest, tallest, and fastest-growing in these forests. For thousands of years, the original inhabitants of the Appalachians coexisted with the American chestnut. It was a food source and building material for indigenous and latter settlers. 

 

The blight cannot kill the underground root system as the pathogen is unable to compete with soil microorganisms. Stump sprouts grow vigorously in cutover or disturbed sites where there is plenty of sunlight, but inevitably succumb to the blight. This cycle of death and rebirth has kept the species alive, though it is considered functionally extinct and inspired the form for In Indigo's Absence - American Chestnut. 

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