Friday, June 16, 2006

B.E.

Here are a few things i was working on Before Evacuation. I'm focusing more on reflective materials, that which has only characteristics of what it is in relation to, which was at this point still the figure. With this tinsel piece i pinned pieces of tinsel to the wall and melted it to the wall where i saw my reflection.






And here are some of the chain-link fence secret insertions i was doing. They are photographs i took of the sky, cut up and wired to fences in my neighborhood. I tried to find spaces that were more public than private, run-down or deteriorating, but would still be seen by locals on a fairly regular basis. I think i was thinking of them as little treasures that i wanted to share with my neighbors, insert a little sunshine. It sounds pretty cheesy, but when it had previously been suggested that i erase from my neighborhood, i looked around and realized that my neighborhood is already erasing itself. So i wanted to make a positive, if somewhat abstract, addition. Interestingly, many of them were taken down when i went back to photograph, so i was essentially erased. And others are still up, through all the rain and wind, and in one case building construction.







I also like the idea of mysterious public art. I did these at four or five in the morning, hoping to not be detected. I wonder if they are even noticed, and if so what the non-art-school public thinks when they see them.

Anyway, i am somewhat back in my studio, and after clean-up and throwing out a lot of damaged stuff, i'm trying to get back on track. My momentum took a beating, but i'm getting back into the groove of experimenting with materials and processes, guided just vaguely by the concepts i was working with. Mirrors and reflective surfaces, repetition, and accumulation are a couple threads. Also that hexagon pattern is coming back strong, for some reason. I'll take photos next week and post them.

I'm going to NYC for a weekend packed with art. I'm super excited to see the Eva Hesse shows, also On Photography at the Met (i just read the book last week), and many others. I can't wait. It's a good sign when you think every show and artist you hear about has work related to what you're doing...right?

5 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

hey. did you see those red plastic cups inserted into the chain link fence on the broadway/atwells overpass over I-95? together they formed an image of a bicycle. like the kind of image youd make by coloring in squares of graph paper. different but sort of similar to your fence insertions. i felt a beatific feeling when i saw it. but someone's been messing with the cups so the magic has fled.
-kaveri

8:51 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey! There were some kinda neat secret insertions in a birthday present I got from my brother and sister-in-law this weekend. Some pictures of a young couple, as I recall. It had to have been from my sister-in-law because Lord knows my brother isn't all that creative. Perhaps I should begin looking for examples locally.

10:55 AM  
Blogger niki said...

Hey you two. Chris, i guess i don't know my own creative strength, because i don't even know what insertions i put in your box. Mat thinks i must have used the Escort section of the Prov Phoenix to pack it?

Kaveri, yes i saw the bicycle. A couple months ago there were cups spelling out someone's name on the same overpass. I thought the best part was when (other?) people used the cups to start other images, but i guess i'm all about erasure, disintigration, breakdown. The success of failure! B+, niki

9:27 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hexagons are the shit. I think everyone in our class should use hexagons. I am already into it, so is Meghan. We could be the hexagon class. Hexagonism sounds good to me.

5:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

hey whats with

5:37 PM  

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