1
2
3
4
poorly drafted lines, dismantled and suspended (2018), cast glass, acrylic resin, 91 x 122 x 91 cm
Borders, at all scales—from gerrymandered constituencies to territorial disputes between countries—are constantly being redrawn and re- rendered. Despite existing only digitally inside databases, or as images on maps and in atlases, they have very concrete, physical consequences, as they control the flows of materials, people and ideas.
In this installation, I consider the physical geometries of the political borders that constitute the countries on our planet. Through a digital and material translation process, they are obscured and abstracted; becoming first wooden molds, then sand imprints and, finally, glass geode-like tiles. Arranged in a quasi-grid-like formation, they toy and tease with the grid as a structure that arranges and organizes information and phenomena. Likewise, the chain as a structure and a motif is questioned: as a form that not only restrains, but also gives form and creates new links and entanglements.
The process of casting and creating molds, the ebb and flow of material, becomes in many ways analogous with how landforms form over time. The ritual of mold making and casting takes on a very generative position in her practice. This is further explored and articulates through the dimensional wall pieces that accompany the hanging installation.
Ultimately, I am not only exploring the absurdity of borders, but also the malleability of representational and physical space: their interconnectedness and interdependence. With this gesture of suspending a grid in an artist-run space, atop the ground plane of a city built with a most rigid of grid plans, one is left to consider strategies of renegotiating and subverting the spatial context that we inhabit.
Exhibited at EXTRA projects December 2019
Photo documentation by LiuLiu