the infra-ordinary Exhibition

Participating Artists

Curatorial Statement

Installation View

“how are we to speak of these ‘common things’, how to track them down rather, how to flush them out, wrest them from the dross in which they remain mired, how to give them a meaning, a tongue, to let them, finally, speak of what is, of what we are. what’s needed perhaps is finally to found our own anthropology, one that will speak about us, will look in ourselves for what for so long we’ve been pillaging from others. not the exotic anymore, but the endotic. it matters little to me that these questions should be fragmentary, barely indicative of a method, at most of a project. it matters a lot to me that they should seem trivial and futile: that’s exactly what makes them just as essential, if not more so, as all the other questions by which we’ve tried in vain to lay hold on our truth.” georges perec, the infra-ordinary (1973).

the very unexpected circumstances of this past year created situations where we found ourselves having to negotiate what it means to turn inwards, physically and spatially, along with finding out the repercussions of this necessary act on our psyches.

it is not new territory for artists. the act of turning the domestic and the interior life into medium and subject has been a constant in art making. artists as disparate as kurt schwitters, mark leckey, andrea zittel and carlo mollino have all used interiority as a way to create a personal mythology in their work.

for the 2021 sjsu graduating mfa exhibition a thread of interiorities made itself instantly apparent. this grouping of artists all looked inward as a means to investigate their relationship with this very particular moment. a variety of approaches were surveyed by them, bringing about pictures of what making art work while being inside and isolated meant during this past year.

looking out the window:

when faced with confinement the immediate instinct is to look outside. windows serve to create a continuum between the spaces we inhabit and the promise of possibility in what is out there.

sashiko, the work of kyoko fisher, allows her to create a timeline between past and present through the formal relationships of shapes and lines. she makes use of her observations acquired while studying japanese history and culture, particularly with an eye on mingei – or art objects made by ordinary people during the edo period. the artist utilizes an intrinsicate process of etching prints with sewn sashiko (a form of decorative reinforcement stitching on traditional japanese clothing). the technique employed by her is a means to achieve connection with the timeline of her personal narrative, while anchoring it in a contemporary perspective.

bringing the window to the kitchen wall:

alana rios’ series the calendar project, speculates on the possibilities of an outdoors rendered flat. through photographing an ansel adams photo calendar of national parks placed on her domestic walls, the artist creates a definite tension between the outside and inside in a variety of ways.the calendars are filled with personal notes while depicting a very public environment. the 20th century classic cannon of landscape photography from the calendar is reframed by shadows created from light hitting surfaces in her surroundings, as well by the contemporaneity of the artists’ conceptual intentions.

i’m sitting in a room:

alvin lucier’s seminal sound art piece, i am sitting in a room, explores the degradation of resonance encountered in a room when the same recording is played and re-recorded over and over to the point of unintelligibility. it becomes a sound portrait of the space achieved by means of repetitive translation.

in thinking about ways where repetition and rendering are used as formal strategies, omar farid harb, paints portraits of his domestic spaces, finding in them new textures and dimensions to bring forth onto the canvas. objects, rooms and people are focused upon and re-arranged. they become the main characters of a narrative filtered through languid brushstrokes. the visual translation that develops from these negotiations with his surroundings, shows the unfolding of a personal lens expressing both a familiarity alongside an unexpected strangeness, which cohabit in these paintings.

monica valdez’ drawings show textures becoming building blocks for a personal architecture made by conglomerating shapes of everyday objects and turning them into imagined ones. the drawings take on a sculptural quality to bring forth the possibility of a phantasmagoric, alternate realm where such artifacts would exist.

i’ll remember this moment forever is the body of work lacey nein created while spending the past year occupied with all the minutiae (and grandiosity) that having a newborn entails. her sculptures made out of the muslim cloth used to swaddle her child, integrate prints portraying moments of her past year’s experience as a first-time mother. given the isolated conditions we were all experiencing during this time, these were moments only witnessed by her. the pieces work as a register or mementos of these private happenings

fantastic architectures:

wolf vostell and dick higgings edited a book, first published in 1969, where they included works by artists utilizing architectural extrapolations. at the time they felt architecture was not moving along with the revolutions happening in the culture. they thought the artists featured in the book, were utilizing the language and form of architecture but imagining new ways needed for it to have a dialogue with the socio-cultural needs of that time.

through researching other disciplines that inform their work, artists will often take liberties that can result into new methodologies pertinent to moving a canon forward.

megan moriarty’s exploration of interiority delves into microscopic levels making visible hidden biological landscapes. utilizing experiments with space, light and sound she brings forth a visualization that shares territory with philosophy, art and science in their quest to manifest the unexplainable. moriarti’s technique echoes arcane methods such as wabi sabi, alchemy and scientific photography. she creates abstract, fractal patterns to bring forth the unseen surfaces that surrounds us.

(e)inter-immensity:

a chapter in gaston bachelard’s the poetics of space regarding interior immensities, may have not been conceived with the digital realm in mind. however, it is not a stretch to consider it as an adequate lens for surveying contemporary inner locales. in that chapter, Bachelard suggests that “since immense is not an object, a phenomenology of immense would refer us directly to our imagining consciousness”.

kiki wu’s digital art project, the release, proposes delving into such immensities and imaginings. exploring human traditions related to death, the irl realm is transposed to the virtual realm. in many cultures funerary objects and offerings to the dead are part of the rituals surrounding death. participants in this project, are asked to share a personal object to the virtual space of the project. these objects are turned into 3d files that become a nft and take part of an online exhibition extending the spiritual body and intention into the digital space.

-marcella faustini, co-director of CLOACA projects

references:

georges perec, the infra-ordinary, 1973, https://www.ubu.com/papers/perec_infraordinary.html
alvin lucier, i am sitting in a room, 1969, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAxHlLK3Oyk
gaston bachelard, the poetics of space (the orion press inc., 1964), 184.
kristy bell, the artist’s house: from workplace to artwork,( berlin, sternberg press, 2013).
wolf vostell and dick higgings, fantastic architecture, (something else press, 1974).