Stephen Hendee

This sculpture is a prototype for Presence Control, an entire environment inspired by the seismic and psychological terrain of California. I was in San Francisco in '89 during the 7.1 Loma Prieta earthquake; afterward, urban legends about the quake abounded. One story often repeated was about a guy who was at Game 3 of the World Series between the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland A's, when the stands did a wave that none of the fans could match. After the baseball game was called because of "disaster," he finds that his car has been stolen. Months go by. Finally his car is found amid the rubble of the Cypress Freeway in West Oakland. The jury of just deserts follows that since the car thief was more interested in stealing cars than in witnessing one of the strangest occurrences in sports history, he deserved such a fate. The title Presence Control refers to the active pursuit of stability in a place where change is constant.