Artist Lecture - Mika Rottenberg

Mika Rottenberg said that she likes to utilize certain signifiers to actually de-signify, so point to specific ambiguities. In the way that marbled linoleum can reference a store floor, but can be one of many many different kinds of store. In this way, she said she sometimes utilizes this strategy to "erase culture" in a work.

Erasing culture is an interesting idea. Upon hearing her say that, I thought of it in a negative sense, but seeing her use made me realize that erasing culture can make a piece more universal. The strategy is also a fantastic way to work with the hide/reveal balance. I think of other examples of "erasing culture", and the other end of the spectrum presents itself. The multi-culture rich environments of Blade Runner or 5th Element's dystopian future show a muddy, twisted, confused mix and mash of cultural signifiers that seems to signal the melting pot/tossed salad gone haywire. These two ends of a spectrum have their uses, perhaps the subtractive strategy (as opposed to the additive) would be a good element for me to consider in trying to make my works "universal".

Another element of cultural, or at least social, signifier is her use of the marxist extension of people to things, back to people. People made all things, so things can be considered extension of people. Her connection of bodily functions to mechanical functions in very Rube Goldberg-esque machinations certainly illustrates this in a visceral way.

This leads to another method in her work, using the work as a mirror, to show the viewer processes in their own life, and compare/contrast the subjective internal with the objective external. The level of engagement (mostly accomplished with close-up shots of the mechanical and the corporeal, and with high key post sound work) is an element I'm trying to understand. I'd prefer a more subtle approach in my own work, yet have so far found my work to be somewhat lacking in its engagement. While Mika's approach seems (and is appropriate for her work) wildly heavy-handed, I need to add some seductiveness to my work to be more successful with the level of engagement it functions on.

Jean Bevier

In addition to teaching, Jean Bevier has been a practicing graphic designer throughout her career. She received an MA in Visual Communication Design from Kent State University and an MFA in Book and Paper Arts from Columbia College Chicago. In 2007, Jean was the recipient of the Excellence in Teaching award at Dominican University. Jean is an emeritus member of the University and College Designers Association, having served on its Board of Directors as well as co-chairing two national conferences for design educators. Jean was recently elected to the UCDA Foundation Board of Directors.

Jim Campbell

Jim Campbell mixes science and techinology with conceptual communication to create art. Often using "hi tech" means to deliver low tech results, his work abstracts and distorts through digital processes seemingly straightforward subjects such as people walking, waves breaking, and rain. These basic elements are flushed through processes that render them much lower resolution than in “real life”, and delivers them in an interesting stylization, usually tied to a form of sculptural representation.

I feel that currently, Jim Campbell is an artist that i can stylistically look up to; I'm also into the low-tech/hi-tech play-off, with an interest in interaction. Jim's work is much more resolved than mine, however, and the hi-tech end of his work, is WAY higher tech than what I can do.

There are moments when I wonder if his work suffers from that however, with people being more interested in the technical process than the conceptual statement. Sometimes, work that's made to address that interplay comes off as disengaged with “real world” issues, and tastes of sterile academic discourse. I feel that while the majority of Jim's work treads that line carefully, it might slip over into sterile technical tricks on occasion.

Artist Biography
Jim Campbell was born in Chicago in 1956 and lives in San Francisco. He received degrees in Mathematics and Engineering from MIT in 1978. He transitioned from filmmaking to interactive video installations in the mid 1980s. His custom electronic sculptures and installations have made him a leading figure in the use of computer technology as an art form.

Excerpt from the essay "Jim Campbell: Working in the Open Sphere" by Marilyn A. Zeitlin from the catalog Jim Campbell: Transforming Time, Electronic Works 1990-99, published by Arizona State University Art Museum:

“By joining physics and metaphysics in a mutual safari into epistemology from assorted scientific, artistic, and spiritual positions, while remaining acutely aware of the limitations to our ability to know, Campbell's work reinforces the skepticism characteristic of the body of theoretical writing loosely collected under the rubric ‘postmodern.’ The perennial human desire to know is paired with a need to know how we know. Campbell's genius, if I may use such a word, is in his skill at bringing us back to that state of relative innocence in which we again ask not only what reality might be but how we can know it when we sense it....”

“Art is the highest form of communication that human beings have,” said Gilbert, who is also a painter. “I'm interested in how humans perceive things.”
Pupa Gilbert, biophysicist, University of Wisconsin-Madison
“Where Physics Meets Art”, By Clara Moskowitz, LiveScience Staff Writer, February 2010

“His work has a timeless quality in its ideas, its conceptual concision, and its apparent simplicity.”
Marilyn A. Zeitlin, "Jim Campbell: Working in the Open Sphere", Jim Campbell: Transforming Time, Electronic Works 1990-99

Interview with by Julie Henson

Gallery representing artist - Hosfelt Gallery

Artist Website

Stephanie Brooks

Stephanie Brooks hits my funny bone, while not going light on the conceptual. Language is something that I've been interested in for a long time, but have shied away from using in my work. Social behaviour begins in language- the halt of work at Tower of Babel due to confused tongues being a classic illustration- and my interest in social perception/awareness is essentially based in word play.

Her formalist approach entices my attraction to clean, orderly design. The humorous side of the work gives it life, air, approachability. Like much humours work, the funny of it allows the viewer to draw near to the work, to let down their guard, and ultimately allows the piece to speak more clearly and effectively. This kind of wit, balanced with depth, is something i'd like to achieve.

An American artist, born 1970, Her work uses written word, stripping down the comedic gesture to linguistic games and turns of phrase, offering subtle infiltrations into the signs and devices that sructure our everyday life as well as language in general.

"[Brooks's] witty representation of an instinctually unconscious thought process as a simple visual equation prompts a unique consideration of how language and socialized behaviour interrelate."
Comedy is not Pretty, Molon & Rooks, Independent Curators International, 2005, ISBN 0916365727

"I'm as concerned with the formal properties of the work, scale especially, that I have to insist that they are both formally and conceptually driven. Formalism is the vehicle that drives the idea home, pardon the auto metaphor. In the academy, there seems to be this notion that the two terms, formal and conceptual, are oppositional. I've been discouraging this way of thinking for years, but recently in my work I've begun to recognize just how important the formal aspects of my work are and I'm trying to pay more attention to them in studio practice and discourse."
-Stephanie Brooks, interview with Beverly Rauenberg, fnews magazine, November 2004






Link to an interview with the artist.

Link to gallery representing artist - Rhona Hoffman Gallery

Link to artist website

Erwin Wurm

Erwin Wurm's work strikes me as being light, humurous, and deftly clever. There's a wit beneath the sarcasm that holds me. I laugh to myself on seeing his work, but below the initial layer of light-heartedness, there's a stab of intelligence that would evade all other than the sensitive viewer.

Wurm cocks a snook at the gallery establishment but is not disrespectful of the gallery. His use of materials is impressive, from common household objects, to sculpted foam & dust, and most of all his execution. His "Dust" series is incredible, and reminds me of the Wolfgang Laib pollen pieces. The care and precision rivals the labor an oiler painter, the calculations of a darkroom photographer, but Wurm's handling dust! And fashioning it into evidence of something, not the thing itself. The ability to cleverly point at something that once was, but is no longer (in this case with a flare of cynicism) is a difficult balance to achieve- Wurm delivers.

I'm curious what happens at the end of the installation- does the gallery just blow away the remaining dust? does Wurm vacuum it up for the next piece? is he particular about what kind of dust he uses? is he stopped at airports with suspicious bags of dust?

Artist Biography
Austrian, born 1954, currently lives and works in Vienna and Limburg, Austria.

Wurm is quoted as saying: "I am interested in the everyday life. All the materials that surrounded me could be useful, as well as the objects, topics involved in contemporary society. My work speaks about the whole entity of a human being: the physical, the spiritual, the psychological and the political."

Erwin Wurm is known for his humorous approach to formalism. About the use of humor in his work, Wurm says in an interview: "If you approach things with a sense of humor, people immediately assume you're not to be taken seriously. But I think truths about society and human existence can be approached in different ways. You don't always have to be deadly serious. Sarcasm and humor can help you see things in a lighter vein."

Quotes
1. "dear erwin, are your box statues anatomically correct? if not, how do you tell the male boxes from the female? I tried looking under their clothes, but it was really, really hard to tell." -name withheld

"at the moment, there are just male boxes, no female boxes. don't ask me why - I have no idea. an inner voice told me just to make male boxes."- erwin wrum
- letters to the artist - erwin wrum: narrow mist, ullens center for contemporary art (UCCA), beijing, july 17th to september 15th, 2010

2. "I am interested in the everyday life. All the materials that surrounded me could be useful, as well as the objects, topics involved in contemporary society. My work speaks about the whole entity of a human being: the physical, the spiritual, the psychological and the political."
- erwin wurm, Erwin Wurm: The Artist Who Swallowed the World, Davila, Fleck, Kunde, Pfaller, Waspe, MUMOK Museum Moderner Kunst; Hatje Cantz 2007, ISBN-10: 3775718664


Narrow House


Narrow House, bathroom


Instructions on How to Be Politically Incorrect


Looking for a Bomb

Link to an interview with the artist
Link to gallery representing artist
Link to artist website