Intermezzo Suite, 2014
Intermezzo Suite is a triptych of interventions installed at the Kreeger Museum in Washington D.C.
With water as the unifying thread, the works respond to the Kreeger’s travels and art collecting patterns as well as the architecture of Philip Johnson; in particular his desire to bring the outdoors inside and his attention given to materials and framing views. The suite includes objects such as hand-cast soap bars shaped like oysters, a Duratrans site-specific installation, and an embedded video raising the ideas of sanitation, purification, and ritual in context of a common domestic setting.
It consists of three parts:
PART ONE: CLEANSING – Cast soap oyster shells, steel mesh. 10” D, signage 11 x 8.5”
PART TWO: SUSTENANCE – site specific installation Duratrans. 52” x 45” (oval)
PART THREE: PROCESSION – Cast sugar oyster shells, steel mesh. 15” x 15”, video 8:55 MIN
Part I: Cleansing: hand-made soap bars cast from oysters are arranged in the public bathrooms to raise the idea of sanitation, cleansing and ritual in the context of a common domestic setting. A companion label explains the filter-feeding mollusks source in the Chesapeake Bay and their vital relationship to water detergency.
Part II: Sustenance: A semi-transparent photograph hangs illuminated from the window behind. In between two sculptures and at a slightly competing scale, the shark presented is filtering water as it feeds on plankton. Much like the filtering of water, here the flora of the man-made tropical rainforest lends a natural frame and background to the work, evoking the whale shark’s habitat and standing out from the more static tones and poses of the nearby sculptures.
Part III: Procession: Located in the library, this video piece (2 minute excerpt above) blends footage of water-related systems inherent in Johnson’s design incorporating light and color found in works from the collection into an abstract composition of its own. Appealing to both mind and heart, these installations about care-giving and regeneration pierce the confines of everyday reality and encourage us to rethink their place in the world around them. Library installation images below, full run time of video is 8 minutes 55 seconds.
