Detail from collage "The Grass is..." Paula Martin 2001

 "Everybody's looking for their true selves. We're all trying to fulfill ourselves, understand ourselves, get in touch with ourselves, face the reality of ourselves, explore ourselves, expand ourselves. Ever since we dispensed with God, we've got nothing but ourselves to explain this meaningless horror of life. I think that that true self, that original self, that first self, is a real, mensurate, quantifiable thing...tangible and incarnate and I'm going to find the fucker." --rant by Eddie Jessup in "Altered States", 1980
Inspiration for the rebirthing tank and other class projects came from many, many sources..... Here is a list of movies, books, people, technologies, and ideas that influenced me (in no particular order): Altered States, Existenz, Gattaca, Brave New World, Cloning, Hypnosis, Holograms, DNA, Fingerprints, Bladerunner, Bubbles, Braille, Johnny Mnemonic, The Saint, Neuromancer, Michael Jackson, Dream States, Personal Ads, Quantum Theory, Twins, Teleportation, Star Wars, Philip Lee, All of the world's supermodels and the people who airbrush them to perfection, Marcus Novak, Tetsuo II Body Hammer, Maria Luisa Palumbo, the malleable fetus, Leonardo DaVinci, Neurons, Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Holography, and Tele-Immersion...