The work you see here was created from computers, laptops, servers, silicon wafers, and even a few printers and scanners that have been completely broken down to the basic components. Destined for landfills or to be melted down for scrap, I took the parts that most people never see and turned them into beautiful, one-of-a-kind art.
Treasures from Intel, IBM, and Cray
The first IBM© wafer I was able to get is small, and it is "diced" — which means the very thin chips have been cut apart and are still on the original backing.
Here you see it mounted on a backing wafer that is slightly larger, and the two are tucked in another partial scrap wafer — the three sitting on top of yet another.
On the right is a black and white square Photo Mask that was used in the production of Cray© computers. Below are four Photo Masks that were used in the process of making Intel© processors.
There are other semiconductor chips that wander around the piece which are actually rejects that for whatever reason did not pass quality control at the factory. They sat around for a few years before I brought them home to use for the art. The patterns you see are actually created when good chips are removed and used, while these were simply left behind on the wafer for scrap processing. Microprocessor Building Blocks
This piece started after I sat looking at the purple-blue center wafer. I intentionally cut apart memory and other semiconductor chips to get past the fact that using old computers and silicon wafers as a medium for art, the shapes I can work with are pretty much circles, squares, and rectangles. Cutting edges off the diced wafers helps, and stacking also gives a new dimension to these simple shapes.