Project 2

  

By presenting fragments of past and present lives (personal and ambiguous) and by also harmonizing the natural and artificial worlds we live in and create, I explore the questionable spaces between the extremes where we all exist. The reattached branch, the breathing tree, the momentary casts of my self, and the memories of my experiences in combination with other natural materials, catalyze thinking in a shared space about the in-between that connects us all in the now.

 

After completing my 1st natural sculpture, I noticed this tree in a new light. I now saw her as a very uniquely posed woman that is both fun and thoughtful. She playfully exudes continual growth, strength, flexibility, beauty, balance, wisdom, and grace (attributes that I believe constitute an impressive and notable woman.) This whimsical outdoor installation was the progressive next step at bringing my ideas more to life. 

The use of more living matter such as the multiple plant fibers that were casted and/or applied, and including the openness of the environment and the public to affect the content are all important factors of my work and the conversation the installation is creating. By taking my work outside to live, I feel it becomes more real and opens up the playing field for interaction. I tangibly came to understand this more today.

As I approached her crossing the street from the parking lot, I noticed the tree had been adorned with suspended bottles. Getting closer I noticed how well they were integrated into what I had started. They were filled with personal messages of female identity and much more that I didn't get to fully explore. It was as if somebody had done what I had not yet thought of or put together. Then later in the afternoon they had been cut down and only a few pieces of rope remained tied to the tree limbs. This person shared a moment of enhanced reality with me which allowed us to see beauty in a commonly overlooked being thus motivating our choices to include the public in the experience. I hope to find out who did this additional work but know that regardless of the basis of the individual's intentions with this tree, there are no coincidences and an enchantingly fun, significant, multidimensional dialogue has potentially begun...

"Room Full of Quiet" Documentation

Room Full of Quiet Artist Statement:

In my ceramic work I present the audience with energetically marked, thick, heavy vessels that engage and express my notions of nature and our relationship to it. Here, I wanted to address a different aspect of nature that isn’t as easily captured by actions; a silence that collects and projects sound for miles.  The crisp, dry air of a northern Minnesota night combined with fresh snowfall dampens and amplifies sounds at the same time.  Every winter I cherish the chance to hear this silence.  To feel the sound of all the currents of wind blow through the trees while train whistles eek out from what seems like a different country engages my full attention.  It becomes the most beautifully loud quiet place on the planet.  Quiet is a quest.  My father (who recorded this) found his quiet after work rocking in this chair.  Years earlier he gave me quiet, rocking me to sleep in this same chair.  I present you with a kind of quiet that isn’t silence.  Everyday we are filling space with more sounds.  I find the most powerful to be in the spaces of quiet. 

DOCUMENTATION 1

DOCUMENTATION 2

TheBodyWasNeverAFreeGift

The Body Was Never A Free Gift

I began this project with the intention of a video installation project, eight different projectors with two projections onto four walls.  It initially started with thinking I wanted videos of random people and just their eyes.  However, the more I thought about it, I knew it had to be my family because of the motivation behind the concept of the videos.  I recorded my family members that I am really close to.  I recorded their faces, thinking this would allow me to change if I only wanted their eyes or if I wanted their faces or more. Initially, I had wanted just the eyes because eyes are an important part of communication.  

While recording them, it provided an interesting experience for us.  I noticed the silence we shared, which is something we do all the time yet it was different because there was a recording object between us.  It was also interesting that they completely trusted me to record them and didn’t question it other than out of interest for the project I was working on even though most of my family dislikes being on camera.  There is a supportive element to this project, as well as a very intimate component.  I started with my mom because she was in the hospital, and at the time of the recording we weren’t sure if she was going to make it.  We still aren’t, she is still waiting to see if she can get back on the transplant list.  I am constantly scared about losing someone else in my family or someone important to me because we have faced a lot of deaths and hardships, which was part of the concept behind this.   After my mom, I recorded my grandma, then my nieces, my nephew, and then my sisters.   As I was editing the footage, I began to think about how to display the videos, realizing I didn’t think I agreed with my original idea any more.  I decided to display them next to each other in a grid, with each face disappearing eventually behind static.  Also, while editing the video, either due to my lack of knowledge in this field or just how it has to be done, the videos were losing quality, even saving them at high qualities.  I debated whether this was a good thing or not.  I realized though, I enjoy it when the material is able to work with me and communicate and dislike forcing a material into something it doesn’t want to be.  I, therefore, left the videos to lose quality and become less clear.  As it became less clear, it began a dialogue of memories for me and as someone dies over time the pain lessens slightly even though we never forget them.  This fear reminds me constantly that our bodies are temporary, and only offering us a form for us to borrow for a short time to fulfill our aspirations.  The body comes with weaknesses, and we need to realize that we only have so much time to be with our loved ones and to make our dreams come true, as we come to realize the body was never a free gift.    

1-2-3

Sounds of Storage

Deep Water

Chamber Choir Documentation

"Chamber Choir" 
WSU Alternative Media
Installation, Projections, and Sound
by: Tony Marshall
Sound Engineered by: Adam Spanier of Solitude Studios

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy1gGN3ji4M

With this work, I am questioning psychological elements of our human nature and intuition. How much of our primal and childlike instincts continue to be a part of our lives as we grow up? How does the psyche balance our natural curiosity and our sense of possible danger? What do we qualify as dangerous and/or beautiful? Where do these things overlap? The piece becomes more of a psychological space, the longer that the viewer is inside of it. The constructed space works to balance the alluring nature of the beautiful colors and the mysterious and possibly dangerous phantoms.