In Exposed Bone, I locate teeth at the symbolic center of the dislocation between the posed and the real.  How often do we smile (especially for the camera) in a genuine expression of an internal impulse?  How often do we smile to concede, mollify, placate, or create a false perception? (How often do we expose our bone alone?)

More than just the flash of a smile, though, teeth symbolize both great strength and great vulnerability.  They are the sprout of our skeleton, our grinning skull (the ultimate symbol of death) and yet they play a vital role in the intake and processing of life-sustaining food. Without teeth, one becomes a survival-of-the-fittest failure, while simultaneously exposing less of one’s visible mortality.  We bare them in exultation and horror, pain, surprise and shock.  We clean them, bleach them, pick and cap them, shape, veneer, gold plate and straighten them. We gnaw and tear flesh from other bones with them.  Raw, exposed bone, our skulls threatening to break free, a threat they will eventually make good on.  They are plugs, to keep humanity from leaking out through fragile gums - skull ambassadors, free agents, scouts - not flesh, not exactly skeleton - unfaithful, disengaged forerunners to tell the skull what it’s like out here.  Segue between life and death, they sprout from bodies that will someday recede, exposing bare bones like something buried in the snow.