Annex
Beth Pederson, Artist in Residence

Through the process of appropriating everyday objects from my studio, the Annex building and other places that I frequent, I will be creating an installation that represents the infrastructure of buildings. I am interested in the complexity of buildings and the things we do not always see or simply ignore. I think of buildings as giant machines composed of different systems. Each system is designed to perform a specific function in order for a building to operate. These systems and their components are the subjects that I want to draw attention to in my installation.

The purpose of the installation and its use of illusion is to get people to slow down and observe how even a simple pipe or a light switch can be thought of as beautiful. I am interested in why we choose to look at some objects while ignoring others and how I can get people to look at things that they normally wouldn’t pay attention to. The installation also examines how people relate to their urban environments and how their perception of everyday objects can change when the objects are recreated as paintings and placed in a gallery setting.

To construct this sense of illusion I start with photographs of objects, isolate the objects from their contexts and then recreate them in the form of painted cutouts. These cutouts will then be arranged in the gallery to create an illusion of the infrastructure that exists within buildings. The result of the installation will be a room that will immerse the viewer among commonplace objects while also allowing the audience to absorb the colours, shapes, textures and systems that collectively make up the skeleton of buildings. The installation will also serve to project the inner workings of buildings and reveal their importance in our daily lives.

Exhibition date: October 4 – November 3, 2007

Artist Talk: Saturday, October 13, 2007, 1pm
at Harcourt House Gallery

gallery   Kim Huynh    The New Alchemists