Propositions for future projects

 

Future Portal

13' high on a 15' square base, with 4 entrances 7' by 3'; woven of collected cotton T-shirts.

 

To create a protected yet porous space of the imagination where the future we most want to live in together can be envisioned. The first pyramids were built by an army of slaves and artisans who labored for years. They were closed burial sights meant only for the great leaders, where the wealth and beauty of a whole civilization was hoarded and images of everyday life were meant to be passed on into immortality. A pyramid for today would be a porous space, not a closed tomb, where people could see in form all sides, and from the inside out as well.  Artists' collaborations today have the same will to make what they do live into the future, and collective effort is the driving force behind how that is happening. Lead artist Margaret Parker and the 555 artist collective create the walk-through space, 13' high on a 15' square base, with 4 entrances 7' by 3'. woven of collected cotton T-shirts. Members from the collective add their work to the interior of the pyramid. The free standing welded rebar support structure is made in sections covered with fencing that supports the weaving. The elements inside the  pyramid are attached to the rebar structure.

 

 

 

Nautilus: a residency

approximately 40'h with 30' diameter base, woven of collected T-shirts

built during a 2 month residency with community participation

 

The Chambered Nautilus is a mollusk whose shell grows in a spiral of ever-larger chambers, made famous by Oliver Wendell Holmes' indelible line, "Build thee more stately mansions, oh my soul...".  Here is an essential wisdom of American spirituality:  one need not depend on theology but may look to nature, personal observation and the process of growth for spiritual understanding. During the course of a residency, a woven installation recreates the growth of a Nautilus shell. The structure is made of cotton T-shirts, the ordinary chambers that we fit, fill and soon outgrow, written with texts that often express an urge for spiritual transformation. The process of building the artwork becomes an enactment of spiritual growth - it builds a place of beauty which the soul grows to fill. A steel suport structure is suspended from the ceiling that lengthens in sections to the desired height. People may participate in every stage of building the structure. The installation is built on sight and reaches about 40 feet in height. The finished Nautilus is a large tent-like space, filled with evocative shadows, where people can rest, linger and meditate. 

 

 

 

Flood

size: site specific, woven of collected T-shirts

 

Floods and the devastation left in their wake have become more common as weather patterns are altered by global warming. If this trend continues, what will we be left with, how will we be living? This installation creates a metaphorical space that holds in suspension the surface of a rising tide and allows viewers to live through it. The water level is a suspended layer of loosely woven cotton T-shirts, as though individuals have shed their skin or been stripped in the water's rising, and are now just sort of floating. As viewers walk through the installation they sense the water's rise as they sink, the situation that overtook the whole city of New Orleans and now threatens many coastal areas and whole island nations. Deconstructed cotton T-shirts are woven into a sheet that is suspended across the room, hanging from the walls and ceiling in waves at about a 4 foot level. The shirts were collected from communities that have recently experienced flooding. Visitors walk through a path between the waterline experience both being under water and keeping their heads above it. A dense network of shadows fills the space below the weaving, the open neck holes make circles of light. Snippets of text can be read on the shirts, and the full texts are written on the walls. Lighting from above casts an evocative underworld of shadow onto the floor.