Oakland-based sculptor Nemo Gould is a self-proclaimed “Chairman of the Hoard” and undisputed master of found-object art. His whimsical kinetic sculptures are created from discarded door handles, toggle switches, dental drills, vacuum tubes, and even aircraft wing struts—items most people would never look at twice. But in Nemo’s hands, they’re transformed into robots on bicycles, creatures from other worlds, and fantastical machines that move, light up, and sometimes confound. His studio is an equal parts machine shop, library, thrift store, and sketch zone—built around a practice that began in high school with collage, an X-Acto knife, and rubber cement.

In the Bay Area art scene, Nemo is the “Premier Haver of Stuff,” regularly fielding texts and calls from people trying to offload old treasures. He sees this urban detritus as a kind of “vein of gold” running through every city—a resource that’s always in the way until someone like him finds value in it. His process is as much about hunting and sorting as it is about making. He dismantles, catalogs, and stores thousands of parts in his meticulously organized warehouse, ready to flex a unique muscle: the ability to create plausible, seamless objects that look like they were born that way.

Though trained in art college, Nemo says his real education came from renting industrial space and learning directly from machinists, welders, and craftspeople. “Come to the table with your failures,” he advises, recalling how seasoned pros responded to his gumption and helped him develop a skill set that blends craftsmanship with mechanical intuition. It’s a tactile, sometimes brutal process—his hands are strong from years of grinding, wiring, and countless minor injuries. Yet it’s also deeply intellectual: “How do I tell a story with the things that compel me to keep them?” he asks. “How do I transmit a feeling through objects?”

One of his notable pieces, Megalodon—built from a bomber plane’s wingtip fuel tank —was acquired by Ripley’s Believe It or Not Museum in Tennessee. He receives commissions to build robots that exude joy and he tinkers with confounding objects until the ghost in the machine emerges. “My work is still collage,” he says. “I just cut it up and stick it together—I’m the glue.”