WLCM BCK Review

1.) Lyda Craig, Jean Craig, S.A. Craig, 1998

1.) I immediately loved this piece when I saw it. I'm not sure if my initial pull to this piece was because it was the most interesting in the room dedicated to Lyda, or that since all the pieces in the room were mostly mixed media pieces, or paintings, this one stood out. There is something very intimate about this painting paired with these golf ball sculptures, and that Jean Craig was making them as her cancer got progressively worse. They almost acted as something real amidst the often abstract concept of cancer. I feel like just as the progression of one's own life is an abstract concept, the actual diagnosis itself is abstract, these things that happen to us throughout the course of our lives, until they happen, these things are not real- they do not exist for us. Cancer to me is one of those words that doesn't really describe what the disease truly does to a person. Sadness, happiness, contentment- all kind of self-explanatory words that contain within their meanings their own portrait. When you say these words, people understand what you mean, just as when you say you saw a green frog, many people will see the color green differently in their own mind, but green none the less. But cancer? To me, it's one of those words that really don't describe the magnitude of its destruction in the word alone. That's why it was nice to see these golf balls. They acted as some sort of embodiment of the cancer as Jean's motor skills became increasingly impaired. It also added another element to the piece- this sense of actually being able to touch the destruction of this illness. There was such energy and life to the golf ball structures with their bright colors and varying forms, which was this amazing juxtaposition against the portrait of this sick woman, and the caption which described her illness. The golf balls were also taken outside of their original form to the point where she created art from these found objects, and decorated them like some cherished ornament. The fact that they are displayed so prominently takes them outside of their own limitations as things you hit on a golf course, and makes them objects. It's also playing off the forever debate waging objects versus things.  The amazing thing is that Jean probably had no intention of displaying these objects in a gallery space, these were things she did to pass time, keep her hands busy, and I think the fact that they were never supposed to be seen adds to their meaning. I think the caption even helped add another element to the piece as well, where the viewer becomes connected with the work

2.) Lyda Craig, Oregon, 2000

2.) This piece was also in the room with the collection of Lyda Craig's work. I work heavily in collage and mixed media so it caught my eye right away. I also liked how this piece was right after the piece I just discussed in my first entry because I felt like it played off of its energy but in a different way. Instead of this lively fluid feeling like in the golf balls, there is this stationary movement. These figures are just silhouettes, anonymous forms, and even the one figure that has a clear body in the background doesn't possess a face. I can't help but relate it to Jean Craig and S.A. Craig. In that piece the portraits are very defined, but these decorated golf balls are these abstract things that define the piece more than the portraits do, even though all the elements of the face are there, supposedly the most expressive part of our bodies- the golf balls express more pain and growth than the portraits. This element is similar in Oregon, these nameless faces define the piece more than if they had clear-cut expressions. The fact that Lyda chose to remove their identity goes against the idea of a form or a face, where artists spend hours drawing figures and defining bodies and faces with their medium of choice to convey emotion and carve out space. Here what you would expect would be this romantic gathering of souls but is transformed into this lonely happening. We cannot see their expressions, only these forms against a vague background. This might also speak about cancer, the diagnosis, how patients are often just numbers and anonymous individuals labeled with the words, "cancer patient." There is also something beautiful in this piece, something beautiful in this feeling of isolation I get when I look at it. I think the blatant embracing of anonymity and helplessness is beautiful. This giant metaphor for our daily lives, the things we do, the habits we have acquired, blindly going through the motions to appear human, to function. But these humans have no faces. Seeing bodies without faces and lines faintly defining limbs is this refreshing dismissal of what we think forms are, and what we think they should be.

3.) Damian Catera, EOH v.v1, 2010

 3.) This piece was magnetizing, and part of the interest for me occurred trying to figure out whether or not I was enjoying being captured by its constant motion and buzzing. In a way it wasn't just noise and tiny flickering pixels of light, but represented this numbing aspect of technology. I felt completely powerless and taken by this TV set, trying to figure out whether I was watching something or nothing. I can't say I felt a whole lot of strong positive emotions when I was involved with this piece, but I did feel completely overwhelmed by it, caught in the noise and movement, almost like the same feeling I get when I'm watching fireworks or enjoying a rainstorm from my porch. It was this cathartic experience, and I realized I actually had to make the conscious decision to leave. I remember telling myself, "Okay, time to go see other pieces," where it's usually just such a normal mindless thing to look at a piece and walk away, look at another piece and move on to the next one. There was this vibration white-noise like element to it. In a way it reminded me of my own mind. I thought that maybe this is where my thoughts go when I have a blockage, or I'm staring off and locked in a gaze with a piece of dirt on the floor only to shake my head and realize that I've wasted so much time. 

4.) Erik Schoonebeek, Trevor, 2010

 4.) This piece immediately stood out to me because it was a lot smaller than the pieces surrounding it. It was  also in one of the last rooms I looked at before I left the gallery and tied the whole show together for me. It spoke to this theme of anonymity I had been feeling from the pieces I had really connected with throughout the exhibit. Trevor has a name, but his face is covered. How is he any more important than the figures in Oregon? By just giving someone a name that doesn't define them, just as the figures in Oregon defined their area spatially, but not as these real living breathing creatures. Their lack of faces almost dehumanizes them, makes them not relatable as people, but relatable as feelings and allegories for these abstract concepts in life we constantly grapple with like identity, being, and self. There is also this urge to pull off the covering on this figures face. I want to see what is beneath the surface of this teal covering. I think it's also evoking this human urge in me to dig deeper, to always believe there is something more to a person, a situation, a feeling. Maybe this is a physical representation of that blockage, that some things should be taken at face value (or lack thereof)- that there are aspects of ourselves and life that should be accepted for the way they are. I think this also concluded the show for me, tied this whole theme of entrapment, consumption,  transformation, and  loneliness together. Each piece I enjoyed represented some aspect of those feelings whether it was these blank covered faces, a mesmerizing blurry TV, or golf balls decorated like vintage Christmas tree ornaments.