LAYERS BENEATH THE MOMENT

Organizer: Deborah Cornell and Barbara Putnam

 

Participants:

Edward Bernstein, Deborah Cornell, Valgerdur Hauksdottir, Mary Hood, Brian Kelly, Eddy Lopez, Kelsey Miller, Sharron Pollack, Barbara Putnam, Jenny Robinson, Kavita Shah, Tanja Softic, Evan Summer

ABSTRACT

“The strata of the earth is a jumbled museum. Embedded in the sediment is a text which contains limits and boundaries which evade the rational order, and the social structures which confine art.”

-Robert Smithson

 

The desert and the sea reveal their own pulse in geologic time, representing two distinct biomes that have vast differences but also many similarities.   Each has been altered by human action and each possesses a jumbled history.    The layered transformations caused by accumulating interferences result, for the arid desert, in irreversible and inerasable layers of tracks.  In the marine environment, interferences result in a smooth mirrored surface that disperses evidence of human activity and reflects only the present moment.

 

This portfolio will explore geographic and historical traces of the interdependent biomes of desert and sea as they are transformed by human actions and echoed in cultural structures.  The artists invited will represent varying geographic areas, resulting in differing perceptions. The curators will create a site on the internet where each artist may contribute sources they would like to share – articles, poetry, scientific findings or resources relevant to their area, exploring ramifications of ocean and desert from their particular view.