More thoughts on "Collapse"

I'm thinking about trying to develop an installation as a collaborative enterprise with other artists. I envision an abandoned house filled with abandoned art...piles and heaps of it. I'm not sure where this is going, but here are some notes I wrote a couple of weeks ago, where I was trying to reverse engineer the events which brought me to this point....I'd like to call this project "Collapse"

These tilted paintings have come about as a direct result of trying to deal with the problem of trying to make my two-sided “Prison Papers” framed drawings remain straight and level after they got turned over. This problem surfaced the day I was installing them, and I tried to see how bad it would be if we just allowed them to hang crooked by tilting all of them and stepping back to see how it looked. The effect was as if a bomb had gone off, or that whoever owned the exhibition space was insane. I liked the power of this experience, it was a simple device that countered the well-established gallery/ exhibit convention and it seemed to have potential to become a vehicle for communication of a political theme.

I had created tilted drawings in 1999 that could be viewed four ways, kind of like a playing card, so this device was not new to me. Since meeting political artist Luis Camnitzer through the Drawing Center’s viewing program in 2002, however I’ve been trying to realize more consciously my inclinations to create political content in my work and work toward directing it in a more politically responsive path. I began to then see this device as a way to create a sensation of disorder and disarray. A phrase, which I had used in recent drawings, justifying the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan soon came to mind: “We are fighting them there so that we do not have to fight them here.” It seemed to me that this phrase needed analysis, deconstruction and questioning and that through this device of tilting a painting I could begin to explore the immense implications that this phrase carried.

For starters, I thought, I would create an installation “here” of the kind of havoc and chaos that we have contributed to “there” as a way of beginning to deconstruct that phrase in terms of soliciting an empathetic view of “there”. The here/there thing seems also to bring up ideas of nations versus a nation –free world. If there were no nation or group to hate there would be no “there”, just all “here”. Three other elements that are part of the imagery within the paintings had come about previous to the original “Prison Papers” dilemma and now started evolving and coming into play with more meaning. The first element was this idea of “The Hand of God” reaching out from clouds to earth, giving earthlings whatever they wanted/needed to fight their wars or implement their agendas…a complicit and conveniently accommodating God. The other element evolved from the idea of the pageantry of war, that is; ribbons, medals, flags and uniforms as devices to make us feel really good about fighting wars. Their bright primary colors give us an emotional lift. (My sister sent me a link to a music video called something like a “Pittance of Time” on Veterans Day 2006, which helped to inspire this direction in my art) In my first paintings in this series these two elements merge; hands of God, hands of nations, flags, uniforms and costumes. I very soon began to think of clothing as really actual political statements, from Uncle Sam’s flag-like apparel, the flag like patterns and color of national costumes and the distinctive familiarity of historic dress, etc.

The third element is smoke or clouds...

Fighting Here

Here is part of the text for my recent "Creative Capital" letter of intent:

The specific focus of my project is the concept that we as a nation are “fighting an enemy there, so that we do not have to fight them here”. For some this is perfect logic, but for me it reveals a ghoulish cold heartedness that I want people to feel, first hand, through my art. I want to create a participatory installation “here” of tilted paintings suggesting that a bomb has gone off or that the earth has trembled. My hope is that through visual impact and physical engagement with this work, participants can begin to explore a view that is more empathetic towards the “there”. This work will take its inspiration from the memory theater of Guillio Camillo and manifest itself as an installation of layered and interactive easel painting constructions with handles and knobs for participants to lift and turn over. Building upon recent work, this work will differ in that I will paint rather than draw, incorporate the wall under the artwork and try to locate the installation in a non-art venue. It is similar to recent work in that it takes an almost encyclopedic, archival and journalistic approach in developing my imagery. Part of my mission is to put forth the kind of information one might find in an expose, or the work of Mark Lombardi, with the intention that a work of art can function as an elaborate “post-it” within its owner’s lifetime as a visual reminder to stay informed.

Collapse

I'm reading the book "Collapse" by Jared Diamond, he also wrote "Guns, Germs and Steel", and I am truly enjoying it. Why? People like me want to understand why the world is so crazy...and books like these speak to us and are appealing because they lay out a complex answer. I love complex answers! Complexity must open the door to creativity and creativity is so satisfying. There is out there in our society/culture the idea that our nation, like the Roman empire, either has or will get too big for its britches and will collapse. Diamond's book is definately designed to appeal to that slant and in a immensely round about way tries to, through historical case studies, suggest that we can avoid collapse...if we take a hard look at our actions. My body of work that this blog references is really doing the same thing. I certainly can't predict the future, but I can see and hear the many voices that wonder if we are headed toward collapse. As art should, I'm joining in the chorus and trying to play my part in the eternal process of self-fulfilling prophesizing that is, essentially, the way that society and culture are formed.