finger painting

oil on canvas

1' x 4'

plaster possibiliies at REDUX

Here are some photos from my Plaster Possibilities class that just wrapped up at Redux Contemporary Art Center. The kids were great! They weren't afraid to get messy and make some really neat work.

 Alexis - 8 yrs old

Connor - 9 yrs old

 Emily- 13 yrs old

Ainslee - 8 yrs old

public art proposals

The bubble project is coming along. Last week Jarod and I submitted a few proposals through CaFE, a site that hosts calls for submissions and applications for a wide range of artistic projects. The above image is of our aluminum "tool" that we cast ourselves in our foundry at the College of Charleston. This will be given to our plastic fabricators as a mold for the plastic bubbles (seen below). Jarod used his photoshopping genius to fix up the aluminum surface. We will work through the summer to get it to actually look like this, repairing holes and cracks with Devcon Aluminim Putty.

Below is another photoshopped image of a VERY basic example of how the bubble tiles may be installed, however, we hope to see this realized on a MUCH larger scale.

And if you're interested... here is part of our statement about the project... our design approach, if you will.

Charzewski and Moore’s collaborative approach to the design will undoubtedly be based upon our individual art practices. What unites our work is our use of the topographical style, or the grid, as a basic reference and starting point. The grid is a common denominator for engagement in our work and the final result is orderly, yet fluid, and slightly chaotic when necessary.

Part of our design strategy will encompass this topographical style and will result in a sort of controlled chaos. Our collaborative project, involves the replication of a single module, or master tile, which contains a sculptured surface of a bubble eruption that appears to be random to the viewer. The individual bubbles are specifically placed on the master tile so that when another identical tile is placed next to it is continues the bubble topography. We would like to mass produce these identical tiles, and with them create a large-scale installation that responds to existing architecture and enhances the surrounding environment.

why

In thinking about my work and how to sum it up in an artist's statement, I've found myself struggling to narrow things down. Anything I say, no matter how convincing it may be, simply feels like BS. I can't convince myself. This question of "why do we make things?" is something artists are supposed to be constantly asking themselves... there's supposed to be this element of intent, of significance to every detail... right?

One time, I was working on a sculpture in a public space (Franconia Sculpture Park) and a visitor came up to me and said "I have one question... Why?" I asked him to verify... did he mean "Why make sculpture?" or "Why make this particular sculpture?" and he said it made no difference... he just wanted to know WHY. Our exchange was awkward and I gave him no real answer, but I couldn't get the question out of my head.

I came to the conclusion that, if I knew WHY I made things, I don't think I'd be interested in making things anymore. I make things because I want to know why I make things. Out of curiosity of my own creative process. It's a never-ending process. And I hope I never find an answer.

I found the below quote by Robert Wilson in an online magazine entitled Whitewall. Wilson has been called "America's — or even the world's — foremost vanguard 'theater artist,'" and he says...

"My responsibility as an artist is not to say what something is, but to ask questions. Not to say what it is, but to say "What is it?" That's the reason to work."

Good... at least I'm not the only one.

gabriel kuri

I first encountered Gabriel Kuri's work in 2007 at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. The exhibition was a group show of contemporary Mexican artists. If I remember correctly, Trinity (shown below) was his only contribution. These hand-woven, floor-to-ceiling receipts had quite an appeal to me. The minimal aesthetic. The reference to the everyday. The irony between the manufactured and the hand-made.

 

 "Kuri has been described as a playful accountant who uses personal experience as a point of departure to explore the ways we quantify and chart the most basic events and transactions in our lives."

Boston ICA

To my knowledge, I haven't come across Kuri's work since that summer day in Chicago until... today! The first image popped up in my Daily Serving surfing, in discussion of his solo show that's currently up at the Boston ICA. I immediately recognized it. From further research I also quickly found that Gabriel Kuri has been commissioned to create the visual identity for the 2011 Armory Art Fair.

Images of the rest of his work are spotty and hard to come by on Google, but the giant hand-woven receipts seem to be his claim to fame.

job listings in the arts

I thought I'd post some links... some resources for artists. I've been pouring over these sites recently looking for potential post-graduation opportunities. These links primarily pertain to job opportunities. More opportunity-related links to come...

New York Foundation for the Arts: art-related jobs, internships, residencies, and calls - primarily in NYC (but not everything)

Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance: art-related jobs in Philadelphia, PA

American Association of Museums: art-related jobs in the US (mostly upper-level jobs)

Arts Opportunities: art-related jobs, internships, residencies, and calls in the US (listings not as extensive as other on sites)

Alliance of Artists Communities: jobs associated with various artists communities/residency programs

frank stella

When I think of Frank Stella, I think stripes. I think shaped canvases. I think minimalism. I think of what he had to say about turning the painting into the object, rather than a surface on which an image is produced. I like the Frank Stella that comes to mind when I think of Frank Stella.

 

But what I hadn't realized until recently is that my Frank Stella of stripes (above) has been replaced by a man who makes not-so-minimal sculptures (seen below). Stella has been making this type of work since the late 70's, yet I think I'm correct in assuming that the majority of the art-viewing population thinks of stripes when they think of Stella.

It's not that these are terrible sculptures. I mean, I don't necessarily like them, but they're not BAD. I just have this odd sense of betrayal when I see them. Like I'm hit with this feeling of, "but that couldn't possibly be a Frank Stella." Seeing them makes me want to really look into his work and to see what he's trying to accomplish with these wacky 3D forms. Perhaps it's not so different from his 2D work after all, and I'm assuming/hoping that's the case, but I'm not yet convinced. I just really don't like them.

Ok, I said it. I really don't like Frank Stella's sculptures.

Worth sharing, I think... particularly in light of my recent sculpture/dance collaboration. below is a video of a dance choreographed by Merce Cunningham. Costumes and set by Frank Stella.

who knew?

Check it out... apparently I'm on the College of Charleston's homepage! ha! CLICK HERE to see it for real.

KK7

Tonight the dancers will be performing Darkness/Light (the dance collaboration I've been working on) at Kulture Klash! Hopefully it doesn't rain, because they will be dancing outside! Eek!

CLICK HERE to read what Charleston Scene has to say about the event.

city paper write-up

CLICK HERE to read the City Paper's review of the 2011 Young Contemporaries exhibition.

we have aluminum!

 We poured metal on Friday and anxiously awaited Saturday when we could bust open the mold and see what we got. We had no clue what to expect. Since it was such a large mold, we could only keep our fingers crossed that we wouldn't run out of aluminum... the biggest crucible can only hold 80 pounds! There were fears of air bubbles, leaks, and shrinkage, all of which occurred, but only on a minimal scale. We're hoping it's nothing we can't fix.

 Once we got all the sand cleaned off, we had to "chase" the "flashing." Which just means we had to chisel off all of the extra stuff. There's a little foundry vocab for you!  This has been such an interesting process for me. I took a foundry class last spring, but due to a malfunctioning furnace and kiln, never got to do many pours. This project is giving me the chance to learn metal casting in a much more hands-on way, which, despite the hours upon hours of tedious technical stuff, has proven to be quite an exciting learning process.

Young Contemporaries 2011

Congratulations to all the Young Contemporaries prize winners! My installation, Flesh In, Flesh Out, which I spoke about in the previous post (in the background of the above photo), took the title of "Best Sculpture." Pretty cool!

I had one other piece in the show, entitled Objectified (seen below).

4' x 2' x 2'

fiberglass insulation on pedestal

Flesh In, Flesh Out

 

I recently completed an installation for the Halsey's annual juried student exhibition, Young Contemporaries. I proposed it as one thing, and it kind of turned into a thing of its own. It came to life, despite the fact that upon proposing it, there were many unknowns as to how it was actually going to come together. It was very much an experiment, materially as well as formally, but I'm quite pleased with the results.

 13' x 6' x 4'

made with polyethylene fabric coated with polyurethane, held together with hotglue

The piece is designed to be experienced from both sides. Viewers are invited to step inside, which is the most exciting part, if you ask me!

Many people have been asking me about the nature of the material that I used. It's actually been recycled from a sculpture I made a while back... look familiar?

CLICK HERE to see more photos of this piece

a work in progress

I'm in the process of finishing up an installation for this year's Young Contemporaries exhibition at the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art. Below are some progress shots....

prepping the mold

Jarod and I are getting ready to pour some aluminum this week. We've been working (practically all semester) to get this mold ready. It's 4-part 1000 lb sodium silicate sand mold... it's a monster. Below you see the core on the left and the top part is on the right.

The interior of the mold gets coated with graphite, so the metal can flow smoothly and won't stick to the sand.

We have to use the forklift because of how ridiculously heavy each piece is.

Just as we were lowering the last piece of our mold in, it broke. We had a mini freak out, but have since figured out how to fix it. We're so close!

teaching technique with edible materials

My edible materials class at Redux finished up this past week. We had a lot of fun, molding dough, carving melons, casting chocolate and building with pasta! These images are from our last class. The kid's made some pretty neat sculptures with pasta and hot glue!

Kate: 12 years old

Connor: 9 years old

Emily: 12 years old

Zoe: 13 years old

My plaster class starts this coming week. I believe I have 6 students this time, so it should be a blast!

darkness/light

This past weekend was the big performance of "Collaborations: a dance concert." It turned out to be a really great show all-around. The piece I worked on, "Darkness/light," ended the show with a bang. I was wildly impressed with the lighting, the costuming, the choreography, and especially the dancers! Those girls were fearless! They climbed on and in and through my sculpture with such grace, despite the fact that they had only gotten to practice with the structures a small number of times.

I'm hoping to get some video clips soon, but for now I have some photos to share. These are shown in order of their appearance on stage. As you can see, the stage starts out dark, and the dancers are in silhouette. Next they move behind the screen (or "wave" as they like to call it), and gradually, the light comes up and the audience can see them full light.

Did I mention how incredibly awesome these girls are?!

thanks to Arianna Megaro for the photos!

2011 Young Contemporaries

at the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art
Opening Reception on March 31st, 5-7 pm
on view through April 26th

It's that time again! Every spring the Halsey Institute at the College of Charleston hosts the Young Contemporaries exhibition, the school's annual juried student show. The juror this year was Amy Mackie, the Director of Visual Arts at the Contemporary Art Center in New Orleans. She spent all day saturday digging through the 400+ submissions, and finished with a batch of 60 selected works. Two of my sculptures were chosen this year, one of which is a large site-based installation that is yet to be built. The other is a piece I did in the fall called "Objectified." It should be a really interesting show, as a lot of exciting/different work was selected this year.

a sneak peek

For more info on how the Young Contemporaries show works...

CofC Magazine

My friend Kristen Gehrman wrote a lovely article/profile on me for the Spring issue of the College of Charleston Magazine. It's wonderfully written and exudes personality. Definitely worth checking out! You can find the online version HERE

photo by Leslie McKellar

Collaborations: a dance concert

This weekend will be the debut of a project I've been working on for the past few months. For part of this dance performance, centered upon the theme of collaboration, I have been working collaboratively with choreographer and CofC dance faculty, Gretchen McLaine, to develop an interactive sculpture/set for her dancers. The entire set is composed of three pieces... an object on which the dancers will climb (as seen in the image above), a screen behind which the dancers will be making shadows, and an overhead piece that will be flown in (mainly for visual effect).

It's been a truly collaborative process. My design was inspired by Gretchen's concept for the piece, which we've titled Darkness/Light, as well as my own aesthetic and interest in interaction. Gretchen's choreography was built upon the elements that I designed. The choreography is also designed with costuming and lighting in mind. When all the elements come together, it is quite an incredible production. Definitely worth checking out, if I do say so myself...
If you can't make it to the show this weekend, we will be performing an excerpt at Kulture Klash on April 9th... more on that to come!

marina abramović

I recently had the opportunity to hear/see Marina Abramović give a lecture in Savannah, GA. She was the headliner for SCAD's 2011 deFINE art festival, which showcased the work of a number of big-name artists like Andy Goldsworth, Do Ho Suh, and more.

Marina Abramović's lecture was on the topic of performance art, which is particularly fitting, as she describes herself as the "grandmother of performance art." Since the 70's, she's been paving the way for artists to come, exploring the relationship between performer and audience, the limits of the body, and the possibilities of the mind.

I typically don't have much of an attention span for videos, but Marina's performances are so mesmerizing, I could watch them over and over. They're so simple, yet so very profound. My favorites are those she did with her former partner/lover/collaborator, Ulay.





After hearing Marina Abramović speak, I feel as thoguh I've been much more attuned to existing elements of performance in my own work, as well as opportunities to come. As I think about the idea of the "object" in the things I create, I am challenged by Marina's implementation of the artist as object. She is her work.

She opened her lecture with a reading of her own "artist's manifesto," which included many phrases including but not limited to... (in no particular order)

• an artist must not make himself an idol
• an artist must not fall in love with another artist
• an artist must be erotic
• an artist must suffer

Hearing her manifesto made me feel as though I ought to write one for myself. Something to think about.

folded flesh

oil on canvas
20" x 10"