(...I did write lots of meaningless stuff in the interim though)
I took a great amount of interest in the food at Caitlin's show and I don't mean that as a back-handed insult. I don't even mean the food itself (though her cookies were remarkable!): the work she has on display this week hangs parallel to bowls hand-made to hold her opening night refreshments and it seems a very conscious decision on her part to leave these dishes in place long after the food in them has been eaten. Both the bowls and the objects (tablets hung from or leaning against the opposite wall) are made entirely from newspaper.
I could imagine thinking about what a newspaper is in these recent days when circulation cannot always sustain one while an economic downturn looms large. That isn't, however, what caught my interest (true, though, that reading into the materials would probably enhance the aspect that interests me in the show—pun intended).
Because these two things are linked by their materials, I assume that their meaning is similarly linked. For this reason I think of Caitlin's bowls and art (proper) as homey supports for an art opening: she gave us something to eat from, something to eat (we ate it), something to stand in front of and (one would hope) something to think about. We were given all an opening needs and the show remains as a reminder.
1 comment:
I think you’re right that the emphasis in the work was not political, necessarily, or “conceptual,” but material. The size and heft of the objects, the presence of the material, felt more important. But still, the work is made in newspapers and I think it’s impossible not to think about what that implies. When I was looking at the work, I thought it was intended to be a metaphor for political art, about current events in the most basic and explicit way but ultimately devoid of any substantial content.
There’s an undemanding quality to that that felt frustrating for me. And even if there is a strong physical presence to the work, it doesn’t hold my attention, or demand my attention. You described the show (maybe positively, whereas it seems like a weakness to me) as a kind of model-of-a-show, fulfilling the basics of an opening: food and art.
The title is one element of the show that felt like it was asking the viewer for something—, it at least cast mystery onto the work. So I googled it… “trichinae” being “small, slender… parasites of flesh-eating mammals” and “Trachiniae” being a play by Sophocles, in which, Wikipedia says, “Sophocles has cast a well-known hero in a negative light.” It’s hard to say what these allusions are meant to indicate. I think it does open the work up more, but in another way, perhaps, seems like the work doesn’t have enough that’s compelling (or repelling) on its own.
Henry
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