#lightinstallation

Choosing to be an installation artist, there are few artists to look to for inspiration in that path. For painters, you have the entirety of art history at your disposal. You even have time periods and styles to choose from - realist, abstract, surrealist. An an illustrator, same ball park. Sculpture, you get the idea. Installation art, moreover light installation art, we have from the Light and Space movement of the 1960's. Some would argue, and I'd agree with them, perhaps as far back as Thomas Wilfred, with his Lumia inventions of organs and analog light movements. Those are quite impossible to witness in real life, but we do have Dan Flavin's hypnotic fluorescence and James Turrell's mesmerizing projected color spaces. (Will definitely dedicate a post to those experiences.)

We also have the liquid light projectionists of the 60's and 70's, who are light artists and scientists and magicians in their own right - but can only be experienced when accompanied to a musical act. (Although they are indeed making a comeback outside the venues, as well as analog glitch video artists.)

But even with Flavin and Turrell, as inspirational and astounding their work has been, it almost seemed a bit untouchable to me. Like, if I wanted to paint an Impressionist landscape I can run down to the Met, stare at his gardens and seascapes for as long as I need to, and that would be the motivation I need. Flavin is a bit more consummable but Turrell's work is the complete opposite. You're left more in awe with the mystery of it all. It's more of a feeling, a reaction, an experience - quite hard to replicate. Which is, I'm sure, the point.

In my work, I'd say my paint brush is the projector. i started using projections in my work as a BFA photo student because I felt print and the monitor was too limiting. I needed the image bigger, more inviting. But soon the projection had a mind of it's own. I started noticing the strength of it's luminosity and how it reacted to different surfaces. I loved that it could be abstract or still display recognizable images. I started to remove the white wall altogether, projecting on objects like plastic, glass, fabric. Letting the projection bend and skew, letting it drape over everyday projects. I was a bit shunned in grad school for this method because I wasn't actually making any sculptures with my hands, to the dismay of the sculpture mentor. He had a colorful array of names to describe my installations such as "haphazard", "kitsch" and "tchotchke."

However, it was when I saw Pipilotti's work at MoMA PS1 a few years ago, I was enthralled. She had projections, videos she took documenting little details of life, herself, like a visual moving diary. And it was all projected on different surfaces; there were pillows on the floor to gaze up at the ceiling and watch the projections dance. She had an installation of just underwear. These were all everyday objects that were transformed, living spaces, interiors, made to be something different.

The same way I felt that day was the same way I felt a few weeks ago when I experienced her work again. Just like then, she had whole installations of found objects, memorabilia, tables, plants, glass bottles, fabric. And projections to accompany them all in unique and clever ways. One sculpture in particular was contained in a small wooden box that also acted as a home to the projector itself, hidden, to projection map on small rocks. From the small projections to the large room with projections on a bed and on a rug, she found a way to let us into her world, into her mind.