INTERSECTION FOR THE ARTS
09.12.12
(with assistance from Brandi Lee
and RWM)
Artists-- how to set and raise your selling prices. Click Here.
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Intersection for the Arts : (re)Collection, A collaboration with Lost and Found - Family Photos Swept by the 3.11 East Japan Tsunami.
Artists: Mark Baugh-Sasaki, Ariel Goldberg, Mayumi Hamanaka, Taro Hattori, Sean McFarland, Kari Orvik, Kelli Yon.
Review and images by Brandi Lee: Nearly 3000 photos, sun-bleached, water-logged and damaged by bacteria are carefully arranged on the walls of Intersection for the Arts in stark contrast to how they were found-- strewn over miles of devastated land in Yamamoto, Japan. Even without the context of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown, it is apparent the photos have been through something tragic.
In the few brief moments when the circumstances of the photographs origins escape my mind, beauty emerges in the patterns of damage-- as unique as the fingerprints of their owners-- until, of course, a familiar object, scene, or human feature reveals itself and jars me back to reality. A tender kiss, wedding reception, and the family dog are but a few of these once private memories now displayed so publicly. One can't help but wonder how many of the images might now be memorials instead of memories.
To further underline the message of the show, Intersection Program Director, Kevin Chen, and exhibition organizer and Japanese photographer, Munemasa Takahashi, have invited the seven participating artists to create works inspired by their experience with the photographs or the disaster itself. This exhibition shows the results of their efforts.
Review by RWM: Easy to get caught up in the Japanese disaster which lives on with scattered pieces and debris still surviving, and here on display...
Erosion 2 - mixed-media installation by Mark Baugh-Sasaki (right).
Hideyuki Tokigawa video of volunteers preserving & cataloguing found photos.
Print washer with etched ghostly images of found photos - Kari Orvik.
Installation by Kari Orvik closer.
Lost and Found organizer, Munemasa Takahashi, and wall of photographs.
Altered photograph by Mayumi Hamanaka at Intersection for the Arts.
Detail of Mayumi Hamanaka altered photograph in above image.
Wall of cleaned salvaged photographs at Intersection for the Arts.
Detail of photograph salvaged from Japan earthquake and tsunami.
Salvaged photograph closer at Intersection for the Arts.
Mayumi Hamanaka & Kevin Chen say a few words at Intersection for the Arts.
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