Date of Submission

Spring 2017

Academic Programs and Concentrations

Studio Arts

Project Advisor 1

Beka Goedde

Abstract/Artist's Statement

1. Finding a Willingness to Disappoint

Steel, latex paint, wood. An object that attempts to make a self-sufficient structure from a series of failed attempts. Hardware shows as an answer, but over and over, an answer isn’t enough. More than anything, each answer is the sum of its shape and weight, not its’ prescribed function.

2. My Own Sliding Self-Respect

Steel, enamel, latex paint, wood, light fixture, colored light bulb, extension cord. Scale is a measurement of self-worth. Some people know exactly how much space they take up, others lack a sturdy shape in their volume. And light takes up space in the faces it illuminates.

3-4. Tell the Question to the Wall, Parts 1 & 2

Wood, plywood, blue crepe paper, glue, steel, copper, aluminum, enamel, latex paint, spray paint, self-drilling screws, watercolor, nylon rope. Drawings need fasteners to hold together. Bringing formal language out of image-space involves practical considerations, or else pictorial elements begin to fall apart.

5. The Hardest Thing to Move

Wood, Steel, enamel, latex paint, nylon webbing, nylon rope, glue, plaster, tin foil, beeswax, colored light bulb. The hardest thing to move is the thing with the most loose parts. Each time it moves, it changes; it is only held together by gravity, a gaze, and a formal grammar.

6. Trust

Steel, enamel, wood, woodglue, spray paint. “Trust” draws out our affinities for each other. This is a word that can be forged, polished, and put on tidy pedestals. Something we can all understand without squinting or standing back. Not stricken lines, not doubting; communicating (communication is a labor-intensive process).

7. Habits of Spoken Pleasure

Colored thread, straight pins, nylon yarn, latex paint, zip ties, enamel, scrim, blue crepe paper, vinyl rope, rubber bands, plastic wrapper, hemp string, nails, aluminum tape, copper wire, screw, packing tape, plastic netting. At the scale of a thumbnail, all material is sufficient as material. These items are made to be cast away. They hold together by virtue of their lightness, which isn't to say their bonds are weak. It takes a very open strength to be small, held in the palm of a hand.

8. Two Different Plans and Two Similar Outcomes

Steel, Fiberboard, spray paint, self-drilling screws, light fixture, colored light bulbs, paper pulp, vinyl rope. A particular kind of confusion and dissolution, in the presence of other letters and actions that make less sense as a group than as individual parts. These elements can’t even make themselves out from the rest of the room, and that may be the only reason they remain.

9. Keenness for Even Feeling

Colored thread, nails, graphite pencil. Occasional gaps, manifested as non-spaces between the other works, are agents of their own erasure. This is a volume without form, adrift and lacking the vocabulary to express. These threads are, at best, on the verge of recognition and ascribed meaning.

10-11. Words are Two-Sided, Parts 1 & 2

Steel. Each letter taking a square within a grid, language achieves meaning via proximity. A gathering of letters can express doubt (Part 1) or assurance (Part 2). When the grid is extruded into three-dimensional space, it can express both. The words make a commitment to live as objects.

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