'California' is a paper quilling consisting of over 2,000 individually measured, cut, and glued strips of paper formed together to depict the California state flag. The piece is gilded in 24k gold and took two years of sporadic weekend work to complete.

The bear was the trickiest portion of the art piece to figure out. I wanted him to stand out against the background and look life-like. In order to do this I measured each piece in every dimension (usually most quilling strips have a uniform width, not so here). The shoulder and hip of the bear stand almost a full inch above the rest of the art piece.

The red portions have a liquid-like aesthetic, I did this in order to hearken to two famous California-isms: The splashing waves of California's countless beaches; and the flowing wines of California world-renown vineyards.

I gilded the piece in 24k gold in order to point toward the famous California gold rush. The rough and somewhat chaotic gold leafing on the bear gives it a 'fur-like' quality, amplifying its realism somewhat (this was a happy accident). 

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