Test for Lists,
a proposed installation for the James Watrous Gallery of the Wisconsin
Academy, Overture Center for the Arts, Madison, Wisconsin
Lists
is comprised of a series of approximately 5,000 drawings on 8 1/2”
X 11” copy paper that are scattered on gallery floor at the
base of a two-sided screen on which a video is projected. The video
is an animation made from the drawings, which is done in such a
way that it appears as though the drawings have fallen from above
and accumulated at the base of the screen.

A repetitive
drawing process that animates each letter of a word is used to string
words together, which are then made to fall down a screen, and like
autumn leaves or winter snowflakes, their individual beauties and
nuances give way to massive accumulations that can become overwhelming.
The words in the
drawing and video come from a series of lists that I have keep for
over a year. These include shopping lists, names of books, authors
and musicians, and any other needful things that were enumerated
during that time period. By drawing a connection between the mundane
world of the daily shopping list and the seasonal cycles of accumulation
the piece poetically calls into question the accumulations attached
to a culture of consumption.
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quicktime here)
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