Leah
Oates is a media artist living in New York.
For
the flower house I would like to propose that I "adorn" the
spiral staircase with digital photographs taken while in Finland next summer.
I would like to photograph around the area that the house is in and on
a broader level aroundTurku. The images would then be more specific to
the house and the location that it is in and not just of "nature" in
a general sense.
The work would be printed digitally upon returning to NYC on my studio
printer. I would then send all the prints laminatedand ready to mount
and then Jan-Erik can decide how to install them and essentially curate
the
final outcome.
During a residency
at the Titanik gallery in Turku in the summer of 2006, Oates photographed
a series, which will be mounted around the pillar of the central staircase.
The Transitory Space Series
The work I create
first originates as a response to locations that are transitory and
ignored such as piles of trash,
alleyways, overpasses, abandoned structures etc. In most instances
the locations that
I have shot in are not desirable travel destinations, are generally
poor or working class and are in areas with factories, fishing or forestry
industries. I’m interested in this type of space for several reasons.
They have a personal resonance for me as I grew up in a very similar
American town
and thus I have a strong emotional connection and knowledge of this type
of place.
These transitory spaces have a life of their own where people can do
things that they would not do in public spaces. Thus they have an inherent
freedom
that many public spaces do not have. In most instances public space
is cleaned up or presented in a pleasant manner where as transitory
space
allows people the autonomy to do as they please. In this way they simply
exist and change as people go about their daily business of living
and striving. They show how a place can be a reflection of a community.
In this way transitory space more accurately document the mood of a
place and a country than public space which can be sterile and lifeless.
Transitory
spaces have a messy human energy that is always in the present. This
energy is both beautiful and ugly at once. In these places time passing
is at
its most beautiful as individuals or groups try to make a fragile mark
on their surrounding. This attempt is a powerful and very human urge
that can transgress established social boundaries. I’m not interested
in transitory spaces for political reasons. I simply find them endlessly
interesting, alive spaces where there is a great deal of beauty, fragility
and human striving. They are temporary monuments to the ephemeral nature
of human existence.
Paperplane, 2007
Finglass, 2007
Posts14, 2007
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