22 posts from 2007
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fans humming...the screen door
a whistling dinner---
while someone sweeps
on the porch and in the living room: guitar, bluegrass,
a skip spence
of splash dance
and the dishes
a tune in, a tune out---
cups, plates and forks about
naming george, harvey, peter--
eliza, david, cynthia, cary,
myself, out loud
tv air conditioning
laughter
back and forth,
it moves between speakers
(wood, linoleum and carpeting)
"listening to my ears listening to my ears"
there was a piece i meant to make.... like moog but different. keyboard punctuation - a state of mind.
elsewhere's record collection recording.............
i still want to make it feel...and hopefully, somebody at elsewhere will help me.
bright orange stickers, laser prints--- sound, and a desire for .............
selection.
< mood music >
(what it is and what it can be)
< labeling >
ELSEWHERE 2007 Digital Video 0:38sec
Greetings from Elsewhere: as seen and experienced within one space and one time.
A collective illustration of transitory objects and images framed by media and popular belief.
(printed: labels, packaging, records, paintings, drawings, and photographs; some crafts)
<frames lost in compression>
PSYCHEDELIC SWATCH 2007 Digital Video 2:06min
While at Elsewhere, I wandered through a collection of fabric patterns-- swatches of material on furniture, dolls, clothes, bags, sheets and curtains--folded on shelves and rolled along the walls. The collection becoming in essence something else: a stylistic portrait of a particular genre, defined by the visual patterns present (their designs and colors spanning 1960-1987).
"Psychedelic Swatch" is a play on the idea of psychedelic and the generalized notion of what it represents.
By layering 15 audio recordings that were recorded within Elsewhere, I was able to respond to the visuals of psychedelia-- producing a stereo mix that's stylistically acid rock. Dense with tracks, the audio creates a hypnotic groove of feedback.
records and more records. music playing all day and late into the night... a shuffling playlist of many participants. there are many genres and tempos to choose from..and often it is not up to you.
it seems everyone has a preference for music, but when and where and who depends on "the mood".. the mood of the moment, the mood of the scene, the mood of the one doing the selecting.
moods and emotions can become simple and shorthand when writing and texting. generally, it seems, we all feel on three levels: happy/joy/content, bored/complacent/indifferent, sad/deflated/wanting.
*that is, when punctuation is needed*
"mood music" is similar. otherwise known as "easy listening", "it is a style of popular music that emerged in the 20th century, featuring simple, catchy melodies, soft, laid back songs, and occassionally rhythms suitable for dancing." (thank you wiki.p)
how are you feeling? elevated?
a finite mood ring of possibility......
While looking at plywood, shuttered windows on the 3rd floor…looking out to the sky and alley-- the words "falling water" came to mind. On a boarded window next to them was spray-painted "absolutely no smoking" in stenciled letters. I thought of directives and signs…a poetic response to the potential for rain. (Letting the elements come in and the inevitability thereof). An old building with makeshift blinders to the outside.
From the alley below, looking up-- the plywood shutters open and flap in the wind. If you look to your left or right, you see objects casually strewn about, old bricks, trash-- framed by other warehouse buildings with green in between. Two dogs bark and guard the fence among the weeds.
“Fallingwater” is a house built by Frank Lloyd Wright in Pennsylvania. Its structure incorporates the water of the falls, while being cantilevered above. Windows look out and over the falling water, thereby, pronouncing visual and metaphysical harmony between the built and natural environment.
I began to think of falling water in reflexive terms: looking out, looking in, the relation of a structure to its site, and the possibility of framing a building in relation to a well-known work such as "Fallingwater" proper.
Signage as a signifier, words as signifiers, the ability of "titling" to illicit meaning.
The relationship between construction, a constructed response, individual interpretation, and that, which cannot be controlled-- such as the rain.
Without knowing, my signs and installation produced a rain shower immediately thereafter.
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Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater
A supreme example of Frank Lloyd Wright's concept of organic architecture, which promotes harmony between man and nature through design so well integrated with its site that buildings, furnishings, and surroundings become part of a unified, interrelated composition.
Fallingwater became famous even before it was finished and its fame increased decade by decade. This is because the house in its setting embodies a powerful ideal - that people today can learn to live in harmony with nature. As technology uses more and more natural resources, as the world's population grows even larger, harmony with nature is necessary for the very existence of mankind.
"There in a beautiful forest was a solid, high rock ledge rising beside a waterfall, and the natural thing seemed to be to cantilever the house from that rock bank over the falling water....Then came (of course) Mr. Kaufmann's love for the beautiful site. He loved the site where the house was built and liked to listen to the waterfall. So that was a prime motive in the design. I think that you can hear the waterfall when you look at the design. At least it is there, and he lives intimately with the thing he loves." -- Frank Lloyd Wright in an interview with Hugh Downs, 1954
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jennifer schmidt > "falling water" 2007
materials: building, undulating plywood windows, painted paper, stenciled posters, view
site-specific installation: elsewhere, greensboro, nc
all images copyright jennifer schmidt