77
A site specific installation while a resident at 77Art in Rutland, VT composed of an accumulation of transformed natural and artificial materials re-presenting the embedded tension between a de-industrialized city and its surrounding landscape. A discounted plant in a bag from the florist to protect it from the Vermont cold, serpentine breads on a found shelf coated in and modified by paper pulp and cement pigment, and companion paintings attached to the far wall. The grotesque has its roots in the uncovering of Nero’s palace and the ancient roman paintings within that became known in Italian as “grottesche” meaning “grotto-ish”. In the absence of context (i.e. the intention and method of composition) these works are rendered mythic and profoundly disturbing. Their formal elements to be forever recombined in a grotesque style with weakening ties to the original, a process of cultural de- and re-composition that resists attempts to categorize and exploit it.
