// Leverage //

By Aryeh Harif and Zoe Hensley

Beech wood, steel sheet, waxed thread

5’ x 3’ x 3’

2016

// Boxes //

Birch plywood and black walnut

3 pieces, 18” x 18“ x 18”

2016

// Boyhood Victory //

Poplar, medium density fiberboard

19” x 10“ x 35”

2016

“A child went forth every day / and the first object he look’d upon / that object he became.” - Walt Whitman

The handgun is one of the most pervasive and desirable icons of globalized culture. Particularly for young boys, a stick is most

immediately imagined to be a gun; a friend, its target. Cheap, detailed, replicas are singularly coveted playthings. They are copies of things

imbued with the explicit intention of interpersonal violence. Violent movies and video games are treasured cultural staples, with which I

associate some of my deepest nostalgia. Yet, simplistic narratives of conflict, and a fostered affinity for its tools, leave children with an

uncanny familiarity with objects of violence. With each death over a mistaken toy gun, or the real thing in the wrong hands, our culture is

challenged by the cost of its affections.