Chris Garcia's Statement of Participation:
In 2005, I began a series of sculptures, collages, and pottery based on the written works of other people. The ongoing project has led to pieces based on such diverse texts as The Kalevala, The Book of Mormon, R. Brautigan’s In Watermelon Sugar, and James Branch Cabell’s Jurgen. All of these pieces took on a playful, strange and whimsical character and were a lot of fun to create.
When I was approached for this project, I thought it was “right up my alley”. After all, I had spent the last two years working as a 3-D illustrator to other people’s text. What I had not counted on, however, was the difficulty I would have matching my style and ideas to Mursalata Muhammad’s Haiku poetry. My “whimsical” approach obviously would not fly, so I could get rid of that, but how about my artistic style? I tend to render figures that are primitive and grotesque. Could this work do visual justice to such a deadly serious and sad subject?
After several failed attempts, I came up with the conclusion that honesty, in art as in life, is always the best policy. From there, I re-read the Haikus and picked out the one that grabbed me personally, not visually. From there, I thought through my choice and decided that my reaction was not only led by my anger at injustice and cruelty, but also my own fears and phobias. What was it like to lie cramped in the dark, sailing to an unknown and dreaded end, shoulder to shoulder with the sick, dying and frightened? You could call out for solace, but you don’t speak the language of your fellow captives. The experience was, and is, the thing of nightmares and something I personally could never have endured. With this in mind, I molded a sculpture in reaction to Muhammad’s Haiku.
In 2005, I began a series of sculptures, collages, and pottery based on the written works of other people. The ongoing project has led to pieces based on such diverse texts as The Kalevala, The Book of Mormon, R. Brautigan’s In Watermelon Sugar, and James Branch Cabell’s Jurgen. All of these pieces took on a playful, strange and whimsical character and were a lot of fun to create.
When I was approached for this project, I thought it was “right up my alley”. After all, I had spent the last two years working as a 3-D illustrator to other people’s text. What I had not counted on, however, was the difficulty I would have matching my style and ideas to Mursalata Muhammad’s Haiku poetry. My “whimsical” approach obviously would not fly, so I could get rid of that, but how about my artistic style? I tend to render figures that are primitive and grotesque. Could this work do visual justice to such a deadly serious and sad subject?
After several failed attempts, I came up with the conclusion that honesty, in art as in life, is always the best policy. From there, I re-read the Haikus and picked out the one that grabbed me personally, not visually. From there, I thought through my choice and decided that my reaction was not only led by my anger at injustice and cruelty, but also my own fears and phobias. What was it like to lie cramped in the dark, sailing to an unknown and dreaded end, shoulder to shoulder with the sick, dying and frightened? You could call out for solace, but you don’t speak the language of your fellow captives. The experience was, and is, the thing of nightmares and something I personally could never have endured. With this in mind, I molded a sculpture in reaction to Muhammad’s Haiku.
No comments:
Post a Comment