Kirkland created four artworks for a facility designed by architects Bohlin Cywinski Jackson for Lehigh University`s new Science, Technology, Environment, Policy and Society program. A tall window in the main lecture hall and laboratory wing is engraved with a tree, from the roots to the highest limbs. This potent image, conceived by illustrator Rob Wood, represents multiple aspects of the environment: healthy soil, water to nurture growth, clean air, sun and the process of photosynthesis. At the center of the administration wing is a nexus where the main entry hall, the entries to two auditoriums, and an outdoor courtyard converge. Here, the floor is an engraved “tapestry” that recalls both interwoven threads and topographic landforms. It was inspired by the John Muir quotation: “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” A glass wall separating the hall from the courtyard is engraved with the leaf and pod of the extinct American Chestnut tree, also illustrated by Rob Wood.In the courtyard is a wall of granite engraved with two cupped hands, over which water cascades.
