During a Brief Outage from Hurricane Sandy

I am still trying to approach writing about Parts to the Whole, and slowly, stupidly, realizing that under the circumstances - loss of Timmy, arrival of hurricane, ongoing-ness of the exhibit, a difficult semester - I am giving myself an excessively hard time about it.  Quel surprise.

The response to the exhibit was kind of ferociously positive, with visitors from Memphis College of Art, Rhodes College, the Medicine Factory studios, and Maysey's huge network of family, friends, and contacts.  In terms of conversations, the word to begin with - and maybe end with - is monumentality.  I had expressed to Maysey a fear that these tiny pieces would get lost in the cavernous exhibit space. (Maybe "passing insecurity" is more accurate, because I know my work can - exists to - activate a big space.)  So to have the word monumentality come up again and again left no room for doubt.  (Hmmm.  No space for doubt.)  People simply got it, viscerally and intellectually.  And so, in this vast space that in itself was far from neutral, there was small me with my 29 small sculptures experiencing the purest kind of visibility.  It defied the scale, or filled the room (space).  Most important to me personally, is that it came of its own, as a result of me just being me.

So there's the personal aspect:  the working-through that fuels the work, consciously or not, but is fatal if the work doesn't reach beyond itself to create a recognition in the viewer that is the start of a dialogue.  As much as I dislike writing artist statements, after a million iterations (or more), I see that the statement I have been using for a long, long time is actually acceptable.

My pieces are intimate records of activity that draw attention to attention – given, received, withdrawn, absent.  The visual and visceral impact of each tiny point of contact, overlap, or disconnect are what the work both reduces and expands to.  It matches my experience of the world as the accumulation and juxtaposition of small decisions and acts that seem simple but aren’t: they reveal us, define our relationships to each other and our environment, and open to possibility, stasis, or pain.  It is slight work with a big agenda.

I suspect this one will always be relevant, because it so fundamentally addresses what is important to me as a person and as a person in this world at this time.

Enough for now.  Here are three pieces and another detail from the installation views in my last post.

Wood, paint; 2012; 4 1/4 x 2 1/4 x 1"

Wood, paint; 2012; 4 1/2 x 3 1/2 x 1 1/2" 

Wood, paint; 2012
Left:  3 7/8 x 2 7/8 x 1 3/8"
Right:  4 1/8 x 2 x 1"