And so does Chris. Everyone has a “thing,” and (as cheesy as it sounds) his is togetherness. It’s a theme that’s present in all of his endeavors and loves.

Togetherness is why he loves living in San Francisco. Chris says, “I love this place because I can cross the bridge and be in the wilderness or be in the ocean and that’s such an incredibly rejuvenating feeling.” At the same time, he’s in love with the city because of the people there. “The people I’ve met here are vibrant. We all form this community and well all support each other and we feed off of each other’s ideas.”

Togetherness between humans and nature is the ultimate beauty of his coral sculpture proposal. The sculpture gardens it will inspire will get humans and the sea living together in totally new, symbiotic, and whimsical ways. But, first, he’ll give a human skeleton a second life and a second “skin” of coral. It will then be able to serve as the skeleton for an entire, albeit miniature, ecosystem. The skeleton’s ecosystem will help to bring the global community’s attention to the plight of the reefs. And finally, the skeleton will share its dark significance, earned in death, with the reef, bringing the plights of man and of the reef together as one. “ I want people to feel not a fear, but a sort of terror, that comes in seeing an entire reef bleached.” Chris says. “I want to show them to the delicacy of the reef through the process of what let it grow there. I want it all to be represented at once.”

 But most revealingly, togetherness is what made Chris become an artist. He says, “ I have been interested in so many things. I think art is the one venue where you can do that really freely, and it’s beneficial to spread your interests around and to bring bodies of thought that don’t normally work or exist together, together. I wanted to be a scientist, an academic, a technician. There have been so many things. I can do them all with art. That’s why I think it’s the most evolved place you can be in your culture as a representative of your immediate environment. It’s what I’ve been drawn to about art forever.”

Togetherness is also what ultimately convinced me that Chris is an artist after all. It’s also what made me believe that being a mad scientist even makes him more of an artist. Chris has the passion and control to bring all of his bodies of thought and all of his whackiest, weirdest ideas together in singular forms of expression. That is way more art than it is weird science.

 You, however, can call Chris whatever you want. Just don’t expect him to stop experimenting. “I don’t know where I’m going with any of it,” he says. “It’s all fun.”

For more from Chris visit his site www.ChrisRitson.blogspot.com or contact him at ChrisRitson@gmail.com.

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