DRAINED LAKE
January 7 – February 20, 2022
Opening: January 7th, 5 - 8 pm
Abel Contemporary Gallery
Drained Lake is an installation of a hundred unique pieces made from canvas and clay paint transformed into lake sediment. The pentagonal and hexagonal forms rise from the floor and have a rough surface. The work is not only about a lake that has lost its water but the language we use to talk about it. My work considers how language is muddy and hypnotic, how it can shape incredible patterns, as well as the dregs of thought.
What is the psychological state of a drained lake, a dead lake? Drained as easily describes a collective state of mind post-pandemic as it describes a waterbody. To drain something means to empty it. To drain something also means to lose it. We are losing the purity of our natural resources. The poem, the paintings, and the installation in this exhibition are about water, language, and loss.
The painted images of clay Roman votive offerings are another part of the exhibition. These are images in the creative commons that have been reproduced in many places, but their clay bodies originated from the earth. Terra cotta translates literally as baked earth. A votive is an offering rather than an art object. I have made my own offering by painting it. The clay foot and the clay ear are parts in extremis, separated from the body. These clay objects, relics of a world that is no more, having existed for two thousand years, seem related to the present moment of crisis and uncertainty.
