NOTE: Dedication Ceremony/Opening has been changed to Tuesday, August 10 at 7:30 pm.
1.
Ribbon-Cutting: An Introduction
2.
Co-Relational Art Practice: Temporary Monument
3. I am a Man
and I Have a Penis: Obelisk as Phallus
4. Social
Practice is Dead: Obelisk as Tomb or Headstone
5. About Gary
Wiseman
6. About
Temporary Semi Autonomous Art
7. About New
Oregon Arts & Letters
Words by
Tiffany Lee Brown, Mandy Catalano, and Gary Wiseman
RIBBON
CUTTING: An Introduction
"Monument
3. The Outward Sign (Resolution)" by Gary Wiseman is an installation
at the TSA (Temporary Semi-Autonomous) Gallery that evolves throughout the
month of August and remains on display through September. A
ribbon-cutting/dedication ceremony takes place Tuesday, August 10 at 7:30 pm at
TSA, located outdoors on SE 36th Avenue in Portland between Taylor and Salmon
streets. Please email eugeniousw@gmail.com for your invitation and
instructions.
Gary's
temporary monument series takes place in three parts throughout summer 2010: at
New American Art Union, Little Field Gallery, and at New Oregon's TSA Gallery.
The project, collectively entitled "Monument (Couldn't Have Done It
Without You)," acknowledges and honors the people who have collaborated
with Wiseman through his social and co-relational art practice.
Gary's
work has been shown at PICA's TBA festival, Flux Factory in New York, Igloo
Gallery, the Manor of Art, Reed College, and the Amsterdam Bienniale, among
others. We at New Oregon are delighted to work with him on this
transformational piece that lays to rest one era of his work, serving as a
bridge to the new.—TLB
CO-RELATIONAL
ART PRACTICE: Temporary Monuments
"Monuments
are not about death...nor are they wholly about life. Rooted in the Latin
monere, which means to remind or admonish, monuments are not necessarily about
remembering either. More often than not they, they allow us to forget.
Ultimately, monuments are about resolution, the outward sign that finally all
has been said and done." —Judith Dupre
I
was born and in Portland. In 1995 I immigrated to Australia for nine years.
When I returned in 2003 things were different. I had changed and so had
Portland. The dense landscape of my memory of this place had lost its context.
I was home, but it was no longer mine. I have been trying to find it ever
since.
I
began by examining my relationship to the geography of Portland using
photography. As I reviewed the
images I began to realize that place, though important, is not enough to make a
home. It is the content of a place that constructs the real architecture of a
home. I sought to build shared memories with people, through six years (2005–2010)
of a Co-Relational art practice.
On
the first temporary monument, at New American Art Union:
"Monument
1: Time and Place (Remembering)" stood as a quiet memorial to this process
of collaboration I have been engaged in. A grid of photos representing sites of
performances was accompanied by a video slowly scrolling the names of those who
inhabited each place.
On
the second temporary monument, at Little Field:
"Monument
2: Imagining Transitions (Forgetting)" pressed deeper into the
transitional landscape. There is no physical map here; we carry them in our
bodies, we draw them through our interactions in time. Temporary Monument Two
is a monument to letting go, of knowing that there is no such thing as being
lost if you don't know where you are going.
On
the final installation, at New Oregon's TSA Gallery:
"Monument
3. The Outward Sign (Resolution)" is the third and final piece in a
series of monuments that acknowledge and honor the people who I have
collaborated with since 2005. Their generosity and willingness to play and
explore provided the information I needed to draw the maps that finally led me
to the place I now call home. Here stands my remembering to forget, my
momentary resolution. The end at the beginning.
Monument
3 takes the form of a wooden obelisk, a traditional shape for memorials and
monuments. The obelisk, with its blatantly phallic shape, can also be read as
an abstract representation of the figure. My practice has consisted of
examining people, in relationship to each other and to everything else.
This
work is:
1.
A monument honoring all of the people who participated or collaborated with me
in my work since 2005.
2.
In memoriam of my Co-Relational art practice (RIP) and celebration of whatever
emerges from the ashes to take its place.
3.
In memory of Art as Social Practice: You were taken from us too soon. Institutional
illness and premature death cut short your potential as a relevant
transformational form. —GW
I
AM A MAN AND I HAVE A PENIS: Obelisk as phallus
Even
though there were hundreds of people involved in the work, at its core, it was
about me. I am a man and I have a penis. I was the author and director of the
work, the hub around which every thing spun. My work was an attempt to conjure
and disseminate proactive ideas for the assessment and renovation of the contemporary
social landscape and the unseen architecture that has been assembled to
facilitate it.
Some
interpret my work as a benevolent gift from myself to my community. I assure
you this is not true. I do not deny the benefits that came to my community as a
result of the work, but these benefits were not my objective. My objective was
self-reflective discovery based on self-interest, curiosity about the world and
my need to locate myself within it.
Humans
are essentially self-interested creatures. It is in the recognition and
acceptance of this fact that the most beneficial work (in any field) is
accomplished. I must have a stake in any activity that I pursue to maintain the
motivation to continue.
I
erect 'Monument (I Couldn't Have Done It Without You)' in this spirit. The
third Monument stands in recognition of the fact that I have tried to be known
and loved in this place; I have attempted to discover and understand the
relationships that exist between myself and the world in which I find myself.
However,
this monument stands equally for all those who supported me along the way. I
have been humbled by your endless generosity. I have been marked by your
presence—I am forever marked by all who were there as the art was unfolding. I
couldn't have done it without you. —GW
SOCIAL
PRACTICE IS DEAD: Obelisk as tomb or headstone
I
decided early that the ultimate success or failure of my Co-Relational work was
to be determined by these factors: Were the ideas and experience of the work
absorbed into the daily lives and practices of those who participated? Were
participants inspired to begin emulating the proactive social behavior that
they had seen at work in my performance events? Did participants lead more
people to accept the responsibility of authoring their own narrative?
I
think I can safely say that by this criteria my work was a success. I imagined
that the world I wanted to stimulate would take a long time to develop. But now
my imagined world has arrived—so much faster than expected—and I want little to
do with it. I have felt myself pulling away, distancing myself from it even as
it grows in popularity.
I
do not place my work in the arena of Social Practice. There is overlap between
Social Practice and what I do of course, but I prefer to place my past work
under Co-Relational. This implies a much more collaborative creative approach
rather than an experimental sociological one. I am closer to Relational
Aesthetics (also a movement that has passed) but Relational Aesthetics refers
almost exclusively to artists working in Europe in the 1990's (Felix Gonzales
Torres excepted) who were still operating in the gallery/museum system (Social
Practice in its current incarnation emerged later, in North America, and
proceeded to jump out the studio/gallery window).
My
work takes from both in that I did not reject the aesthetics of the institution
while operating 95% of the time outside of the institution in public space. My
work has more in common with formal painting and drawing of the Renaissance
than it does with punk rock or political activism. I do not deny the political
connotations (effects) of my work; however, these dynamics were not the primary
intent. All art is political even if not blatantly stated simply because it
influences people.
Sometimes
the most radical political action that can be taken is the most simple. In
2005, still under the weight of the Bush regimes' stolen election victory, it
seemed to me that people needed some hope. It was also an earlier era of the
Internet's ubiquity and due to the tremendous excitement and fetishization of
the technology itself (as opposed to its function) people had begun to feel
very disconnected from each other. In this context I believed, and I feel I was
correct, that the most radical political action I could take would be to get
people together in public space to have as much fun as possible. They needed a
physical context within which to communicate; they needed to not feel alone and
isolated. So I started Kitchen Sink PDX, where we could take break from life
and times from which we could emerge refreshed. Then I began Tea Project.
When
I say "Social Practice" is dead I do not mean to imply the same
negative sentiment as those who say "Painting is dead!" or "Punk
is dead". On the contrary I see the death of Social Practice as positive.
Don't we learn from what remains after death? From memories we make histories.
From dead things we grow fresh things. Social Practice is in need of new
methods to manifest itself; methods that emphasize and encourage personal,
ethical responsibility and consciousness of intent.
The
power of Social Practice arose from its direct investigation of the world
outside of the art institution. But this very impulse is an arrogant and
exploitive one. Social Practice
generated a new set of ethical problems in art—a kind of unexamined cultural
colonialism held well-intended utopian ideals. Social Practice has yet to deal
with these ethical questions; the full damage has yet to be assessed.
Saul
Ostrow called this phenomena in Social Practice "uninformed
volunteerism." The solutions to some of these problems could be found
through initiating collaborative relationships with trained professionals.
Anthropology and sociology answered most of the challenges SP is facing long
ago. Anthropologists were so rigorous in their self-examinations that they
began to question the validity of anthropology as a discipline. As far as I
know, anthropologists have still not determined the answer to this question. I
suspect they won't. Anthropology is the study of humanity. Humanity is not
static. It is forever in flux within a set of instinctual behaviors. The
validity of anthropology, sociology, and art as social practice will most
likely be determined in the future on a case by case scenario—this is the most
effective way to assess anything human—with the triangle of compassion, ethics,
and law (limits). —GW
ABOUT
GARY WISEMAN
Gary
Wiseman is a Portland-based visual artist and curator. He works in video,
installation, sculpture, relational aesthetics, drawing, sound and performance.
Wiseman has exhibited and performed in Australia, Canada, New York and
Portland.
His
2007 Emerald City Tea Party was covered by The New York Times, and the Tea
Project in general formed the core of a feature for The Oregonian, which also discussed his Silent Tea Party at TBA.
And here's a nice little interview that Richard Schemmerer did with Gary on the
PDX Art blog.
Gary's
website is on Tumblr. Daily videos from his
current work with Gabe Flores at PLACE, a temporary gallery in Pioneer Place
mall presented by Portland City Art, can be viewed on Vimeo.
Wiseman
has performed and shown with Flux Factory (NY 2008), Nuit Blanche Festival in
(Toronto 2007), the PICA TBA Festival in (Portland 2007), The Reed College
Cooley Memorial Gallery "Suddenly" Exhibition (Portland 2008),
Gallery Homeland (Portland 2008), Milepost 5 (Portland 2007, 2008) and the
Igloo Gallery (Portland 2009). Wiseman has held residencies in Portland and New
York. He has received honarariums from Reed College, The Regional Arts and
Culture Council, Gallery Homeland, Flux Factory and the Portland Institute For
Contemporary Art.
—TLB | GW
ABOUT
TEMPORARY SEMI-AUTONOMOUS ART
The
TSA Gallery series of temporary, semi-autonomous art works, is a production of
New Oregon Arts & Letters. Project instigator Tiffany Lee Brown says she
sees TSA as a natural extension of how Portland organically creates and
disseminates creativity. "It's where home meets public art. The front
garden where the 2010 episodes of TSA is taking place represents the
intersection of public and home life. It's a liminal space."
Using
your own garden or sidewalk as an art venue makes the art experience accessible
to everyone—artists, viewers, and curators alike. "We didn't have very
many legit venues twenty years ago," she adds, "and nobody had money.
So in the nineties in Portland, we put on salons in our houses, for poetry and
art. Growing up in Oregon in the eighties, it was all about bands in basements,
underground parties." In bigger cities, lofts and warehouses might play a
bigger role in DIY creative production, but here, houses and gardens are
plentiful.
These
days, Appendix Project Space near Alberta Street turns a home garage into a
gallery, while the thematic territory of domesticity sparks local shows like
the M. K. Guth-curated "House Arrest" at Worksound Gallery and Emily
Stone's production "Domestic/Wild" at Performance Works NorthWest, a
theatre venue where a proper studio and stage sometimes overlap with personal
space; the director lives on-site, and her home kitchen doubles as a lobby
during shows. Stone, Brown, and other women artists of New Oregon (then called
2GQ) mounted another collision of domesticity and theater called House Bound at
Performance Works in 2007.
Brown
says, "I'm into exploring how art and other forms of expression manifest
themselves in public space, especially unsanctioned space... but also how our
society marginalizes and dismisses the creative and community work we do at
home." Institutions, money, and the media often play no part in that work,
a fact that has been highlighted by influential feminist artists and writers
like Karen Finley, Linda Montano, and Judy Chicago.
Southeast
Portland's relaxed creative feel is part of the point. "TSA is starting
off in the Sunnyside neighborhood," says Brown. "There's a poetry
garden a few blocks away. This is where City Repair transformed ideas about
urban living by transforming an intersection. The Horse Project does well in
this part of Portland, too—those plastic ponies tied to the city's old horse
tie-up rings, started by Scott Wayne Indiana."
Applying
a curatorial hand to this homespun, DIY tradition felt natural to Brown, who
has explored intimate space and unsanctioned public space in art, performance,
and writing. "I spent several years investigating home and my immediate
neighborhood through art," she explains. "I was going through an
intense process of grief and found myself kind of confined a lot. Plus I work at
home as a freelancer, and now I'm pregnant. I thought, well, maybe woman's place is in the
home, after all. Maybe art's place is in the home, too."
It
doesn't hurt that New Oregon is headquartered in an office—a home office, of
course—right in the neighborhood.
Next spring, Brown hopes to curate TSA events and installations
throughout eastside Portland. —MC
ABOUT
NEW OREGON ARTS & LETTERS
The
new publisher of PLAZM magazine and presenter of the New Oregon Interview
Series, this nonprofit organization was formerly called 2GQ, part of 2 Gyrlz
Performative Arts. The group has presented literature, performance, art, and
publications in Portland for over eight years.
The
mission of New Oregon Arts & Letters is to create and present arts,
literature, and media. Its programming encourages collaboration, supports
interdisciplinary practices, and contextualizes creative culture. Participants
are committed to fostering innovation, integrity, and critical dialogue across
a broad range of communities.
Along
with publishing and media projects, New Oregon is known for performance work and multidisciplinary extravaganzas like
"Exquisite Language" at the Heathman Hotel and "Light +
Shadows" at Yoga Shala of Portland—shows that involved over 100 artists,
writers, and musicians. Earlier this decade, the group combined literary
readings with performance at Wordstock, Powell's City of Books, Gallery 500,
and other Portland venues.
In
2010, New Oregon launched the TSA Gallery of temporary, semi-autonomous art.
Thanks to grants from RACC, the Regional Arts & Culture Council, and the
Oregon Cultural Trust, this year New Oregon will also publish a new issue of
PLAZM magazine and a new collective content website at plazm.org.
New
Oregon collaborates with DIY-style producers in a cooperative approach as well,
creating experimental and exploratory work including "House Bound" at
Performance Works NorthWest, the "Public Works" series of works in
progress at Someday Lounge, and "The Easter Island Project," at
locations throughout the US and South America.
New
Oregon Arts & Letters
PO
Box 2863
Portland,
Oregon 97208 USA
www.neworegon.org
inquiries:
neworegonarts att gmail.com
join
the mailing list: neworegonarts-subscribe@googlegroups.com
