Rex Brodie - Rust Never Sleeps

Currently working on finishing a sculpture I started this fall … reached a point where I couldn’t move forward so I put it aside. Found the perfect parts (rusty I-beam and rail road plates) to complete the piece in the scrap bin at Boundary hall. All the materials are recycled including the oval laser cut parts which I found in the trash.  The rusty cans are from the dilapidated barn behind our apartment in Connecticut.

“Rust is associated with degradation of iron-based tools and structures. As rust has a much higher volume than the originating mass of iron, its build-up also can cause failure by forcing apart adjacent parts--a phenomenon known as "rust smacking."


Made from rusty tin cans, Rust Never Sleeps is a metaphor for the slow and often unnoticeable decay of all things seemingly permanent. One day you’re young, the next you’re old and falling apart.