American Dream

American Way

Cameron Mastoras, 2025

Digital Fabrication, ABS, Resin, Acrylic Paint, Steel

Highways are American values manifest. Obsession without consideration. A means that devoured its end. The singular pursuit of a seemingly benevolent idea(faster travel) that started as a dream, became a deity, and morphed into a demon that would define American life for decades.

Like many things here, the thing that keeps the masses trapped was sold to them as freedom. The American people will go to their graves clinging to the cages they were killed in: it’s just the American way

Process-Design

For this piece, I wrote a large custom Grasshopper script to generate the highway geometry. Modifications were then made in Rhino to split the planet up into 2 halves and create the alignment piece in between them.

The file is attached here

Process-Manufacturing

1. The 2 halves and center aligner were all printed out of ABS at 0.16mm layer height. All supports were removed, and any broken sections were fixed with heat welding.
2. 2 Solutions of ABS glue were prepared by mixing ABS with acetone, letting the ABS dissolve to form a solution. 1 Solution had 8g of ABS and 50ml of acetone to make a medium viscosity liquid glue. The other solution had 20g of ABS and 50ml of acetone to make a paste glue.
3. One half and the aligner piece were coupled. A piece of 0.5″ thick wood was cut into small pieces and placed around the perimeter of the aligner piece on the table. Glue was applied to the aligner piece and the planet half. The planet half was placed on top of the aligner and pressed down into the wood pieces.
4. Glue was placed on the aligner and on the other half, and they were assembled together using firm pressure.
5. Using the paste glue solution, gaps between the two halves were filled in.
6. The entire planet was dunked in acetone. After 25 minutes of this, it was tried off with forced air.
7. The house was pained and glued into place
8. The metal stand was constructed
9. The metal stand was heated up with a propane torch, and then the sculpture was melted onto the stand.