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Showing posts from October, 2021

Art, artifact or just an object?

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Hello.  Thank you for joining me. With this posting I am moving from a discussion about objects (and images, surfacing, sound and space) holding energy that engages with those who visit  PLEASE touch , to a discussion about artifacts - because I call pieces removed from their original place of origin, from the original installation they were a part of, artifacts.   PLEASE touch  is full of them. Some artifacts residing in  PLEASE touch  are as they were in their original installation. Oahu , Honshu and Kyushu , Battle Banners , Water Offering , and  Temple Bells , for instance, are all artifacts from the installation  skin.   They have not been reworked.  Now a part of  PLEASE touch, they  differ in that they are a part of this space and time, different, only in placement and exhibition choices.  Oahu , Honshu and Kyushu  now lay beside each other,  Battle Banners bound with red fabric, hover over them.  Water Offering  no longer stands alone, but instead is nestled amongst other o

Art as Energy / Energy as Art, continued...

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Good morning.  After a bit of a delay in posting, I am back to continue our discussion of art and energy - inserting it into a discussion about objects, materials, and surfaces included in  PLEASE touch.  Had an interesting conversation with a visitor who brought her 3 year old in with her to explore  PLEASE touch .  She said her son, Jack, had a marvelous time touching until he came to an artifact from the installation skin - Water Offering .  He reached out to touch the pedestal skinned in burned monkey fur (more on why I skinned the pedestal in monkey fur later), physically recoiled, looked up at her and said "Scary".  She said he would not tolerate going near Water Offering again.   Do objects hold energy?  Does the concept of entanglement inform our perceptions - on a conscious level? A subconscious level?  Are we aware of it?  Can we be aware of it? Jack was. Where we are in our own awareness certainly informs it.  How open are we?  How conscious are we? How aware are

Art as energy / energy as Art

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  Jennie Kiessling is an artist, an educator and a good friend who lives, works and teaches here in Colorado.  While I was making work and creating the working pattern for installing  PLEASE touch  Jennie and I discussed the possibility of creating a catalogue for the installation.  The catalogue evolved into this blog.  Below is a piece that Jennie wrote for the catalogue / now blog. I offer it as the introduction to our discussion about energy.  Our discussion meaning between you and me, as you can leave comments on this blog that contribute to the dialogue if you like.  I would like you to. Thank you, Jennie,  for opening our discussion about Art as energy / energy as Art. That Objects Have Energy Saint Barbara was brought from home to home in EspaƱola, NM. Households affiliated with the local church took turns caring for the Saint through the year. Ritual statues from many places around the world are blessed with spices, wine or blood or a combination. Water, a universal offering,

The art of entanglement

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PLEASE touch When considering how to use words to express about work, how to talk about it and write about it, I find that the word entanglement is extremely helpful in communicating how I experience it all - and, make sense of it all. I could use the word connected, but it doesn't quite fit.  It's too rigid, too static.  Not fluid enough. I could use the word layered, which gets closer, but again, doesn't quite grasp the experience of the complete process of making.  It has a sense of stacking to it, one thing upon another.   I have been looking for a term that is more expanding than stacking.  That respirates.  That unfolds and enfolds, as the physicist Dr. David Bohm describes it - in terms of our universe, not art, but it fits because all that exists on a macro level to a micro level is entangled.  All things inform and assist in describing / identifying other things.  All life is involved with other life (involvement being the best sister word to entanglement).  None o