Sandrine Schaefer Curatorial

Locations: Teotihuacan Archeological Site /Pyramid of the Sun, and Reforma Avenue /Torre Mayor, Mexico City. 

During the 2012 Spring Equinox, DeLuca created a piece in front of the Pyramid of the Sun at the archeological site of Teotihuacan.  During the Equinox, masses of people wearing all white with accents of red visit this site to climb the Pyramid of the Sun.  With outstretched arms, they receive energy from the sun once they reach the top of the pyramid.  DeLuca positioned himself near the pyramid, donned in white athletic clothing.  For 2 hours, he repeated the action of tossing a futból/ soccer ball covered in cochineal pigment (crushed insects) into the air.  Upon the ball’s decent, DeLuca opened his arms and allowed the ball to collide with his chest, leaving a red imprint on his heart.

DeLuca’s intention behind this action was to serve as an abstract model for nuclear fusion (the collision of two elements under the force of gravity), simultaneously creating a metaphor for cultural fusion.  DeLuca re-created this piece at Torre Mayor, the largest skyscraper in Mexico and home to several international investment companies.  Through the juxtaposition of these locations, architecture, and materials (cochineal pigment / soccer ball) DeLuca inspires questions around the complex relationships between ancient and contemporary society.  

photograph and artifacts exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER.  Photo by Sandrine Schaefer

Location: Paris, France

While in an artist residency in Paris, France, Schwebel researched the Paris Massacre of 1961. He learned that during a peaceful march, police herded hundreds of Algerian civilians and immigrant activists into the Paris Seine to drown. Schwebel discovered that this event was not officially acknowledged by the city of Paris until 1998, 37 years after its occurrence. To add insult, the government only commemorated 40 of the estimated 200 deaths. During his time in Paris, Schwebel engaged in a private action dedicated to this repressed and undocumented event. Every day, Schwebel would swim laps at a public indoor swimming pool. Using an eyedropper bottle concealed in his swimsuit, Schwebel collected small amounts of pool water that he would later pour into the river where the massacre happened. Schwebel accumulated the same amount of river water from the Seine. He would empty this water into the public pool as he swam the following day. The bottle that assisted this act of inter-pollution presently contains the pool water with the eyedropper bottle, floating inside. This commemorative action went unnoticed. No one knew what Schwebel was doing or why, yet the environment that surrounded them was changed by the discrete infusion of 2 “public” bodies of water.

 Locations: Brno, Czech Republic

The focus of Ehemann’s series, An Architect Makes Space of Identity/ Heroes is to challenge the local “heroes” of architecture.  During her time working in Brno, an icon of functionalist architecture, The Villa Tugendhat was being restored.  Inspired by the “falling” of what is considered German architect, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe’s masterpiece, Ehemann set out to further question the ideology behind the architectural settings of Brno.  Ehemann created a model of the Villa Tugendhat and engaged in the action of throwing the replica into the air surrounded by various buildings in the city. 

She photographed the replica as it fell through the sky.  The camera captured something that the human eye could not: the in between moments of free space and timelessness.

photos exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER by artist

Location: Launceston, Tasmania

During half time at the NTFA Grand Final at Aurora Football Stadium in September 2011, over 400 spectators spontaneously participated in Schwenk’s delegated performance titled, “Along White Lines”.  The piece began when people dressed in white overalls jogged onto field in single file.  These bodies “became” the white lines on the football field; goalposts, goal square and boundary line. As the audience engaged with the field and one another, they created an experience that melded the art and sport communities.

image from book and clip from video exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER

Location: Trinity Church, Boston, MA

The following is an excerpt from the Curator’s written account after witnessing the final day of this 2 year piece:

“On the side of the Trinity Church sits an unassuming pile of stones. An equally unassuming woman adorned in black stands in a set of tracks that have been worn into to earth in front of the pile. This is the final effort of Joanne Rice’s, The Human Cost of War. At noontime, every day for the past two years, Rice has traveled to this site with a white box that contains 100 stones*. She deposits the stones, meditating on each one, a symbol of a life lost in war. After this two-year investment, it has all come down to this moment in which Rice stands before this mountain that she has built, little by little, and she must say her farewells.  The ritual is simple:

She stands

Pulls a stone from the box

Holds it

Looks at it

Assigns it an identity

Crouches in front of the pile

Releases it into its appropriate resting place

Stands again

Steps back in remembrance

The cycle repeats

Rice never breaks this cycle, ensuring that each stone is given a deserving amount of time. It is the intention that Rice gives to this process that makes witnessing The Human Cost of Warextraordinary. The choice to create this piece on the grounds of a church feels natural and has given the project accessibility, however it is Rice’s intention that indicates that her action could create a sacred space anywhere. As I watch I begin imagining countless places to serve as a setting for Rice and her mountain.  As my imagination runs wild, I recognize the unapologetic and uncompromising fundamentals that have guaranteed this work’s success as a durational piece of art.I come back to reality and we are in the city - a metropolis that carries on around Rice as she performs this emotive ritual for the last time. A window washer even sets up shop next to her. It’s as if she is invisible, and I am reminded of this common response to war itself. However, there are people who do stop and engage with her, some of whom have shared this daily action with her for the past 2 years. The people, who are capable of seeing her and this relic for what it is embody a commitment in their role as witnesses. It becomes hard to watch this woman shivering, her eyes tearing and nose reddening with the cold. There are moments when it seems mad that rocks could have such a profound effect on a person’s emotional state, but Rice believes in this action with such conviction that we believe in her. This is a piece that needs to be seen, and we need to see her finish what she started. It is in this evolution that we may shift our own paradigm and break the cycle of our cultural love affair with ignorance.

A sign displayed next to the mountain of stones reads:

I am thinking about those who have died as kin. I am thinking of their struggle. I am praying for peace.

I contemplate what ‘peace’ must means for Rice after this two-year journey. I wonder how the shifts in America’s political climate have informed the piece in its execution and memory. I am hopeful that the departure of The Human Cost of War will lead Rice and those who were fortunate enough to experience it with her into a territory that is rich with possibility, tranquility and rebirth.”

-  Sandrine Schaefer 2009

* The stones were collected from a beach near the artist’s home and returned at the conclusion of the piece.

Photos exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER by Bob Raymond

Location:  Steuben, Wisconsin, USA

The first known reference to a red carpet can be found in the play Aeschylus, written in 458 BC.  Upon Aeschylus’ return from Troy, his wife Clytemnestra lays out a red path for him to walk on.  Knowing that only gods are fit for such an action, Aeschylus tells his wife, “I am a mortal, a man.  I cannot trample upon these tinted splendors without fear thrown in my path.” 

In RED CARPET, Meredith and Anna repeatedly roll out a red carpet for one another, walking across the tinted splendor without fear. 

In this iteration of RED CARPET, Meredith and Anna chose a Midwestern location with an excess of open space and a low population.  As they traveled across the red carpet, their bodies became engulfed in the pastoral landscape.  This is a reminder that even the grandest of human gestures are no match for the powers of nature. 

photos exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER by Josh Korby

Location: the artist’s home

In 36,835, Goodnough invited friends to sit with her as long as they were comfortable while she counted the number of pills (anti-depressants, mood stabilizers and anti-anxiety medications) that she had ingested over the past 17 years.  Using her own experience as a catalyst for conversation, Goodnough addresses the overabundance of psychiatric medicine in the lives of Americans, particularly young women.  As the piece unfolds over a duration of 9 hours and 41 minutes, a pile of pills accumulates on the artist’s bed and we witness the effects of this repetitive task.  Through the simple act of counting, 36,835 offers an opportunity to engage in a contemporary dialogue on Female Hysteria and the complexities of living in a medicated society.

Full 9 hour video exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER

location:  various places throughout Boston

Phelan placed 4 statues of gods/goddesses connected by death on a shelf for the Stencils exhibition at the New England School of Art and Design in Boston M.A. in   2007.  Each week, he would take a statue off the shelf and take it to another location to cast its shadow in an effort to give them life.  He would return the idol the following day.  A God’s Shadow investigates the physical forms that humans assign to the divine and illuminates the magic that can be found in a shadow; something that is always with the living, but often undervalued. 

installation shots of artifacts exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER

Location: the homes of strangers

Chun Hua Catherine Dong is an artist, born in China, living in Canada. Interested in exploring the intimacy that can exist between 2 strangers in public space, Dong began the Husbands and I project in 2009.  She wore her traditional Chinese dress while walking through streets and asked white males to have a photo taken with her.  When they agreed, she suggested that they act like her husband.   After photographing herself with 352 men, Dong decided to move this exploration of intimacy from public space into private space.  Dong advertised herself in various media as an “exotic, compliant and artistic Asian girl,” looking for a “white husband” who would like to take her into his home and live with him for a day as his “mail order bride”. This is video documentation from the artist’s days living with strangers as their “wife”.

Dong regards the process of immigration as a marriage.  She married Canada, suddenly transformed from a Chinese to a Chinese Canadian or Canadian.  Her physical encounters with ”white men” are conceptual confrontations between herself and the Western social and political landscape she doesn’t feel she belongs to.  Dong often feels like an outsider and believes that the sense of belonging can be deepened through marriage. The process of “looking for a white man” in The Husbands and I becomes a provocative process of searching for home and transformation. 

Living in temporary homes with strangers with whom she has an ephemeral relationship allows Dong and her “husbands” to collaboratively reconfigure the perceived privilege that white males embody, while also questioning the culturally interpreted Chinese female body, both as a foreign subject and object.  The footage that we see from these investigations addresses myriad complexities around the issues of multiculturalism, social structures, race, gender, sexuality, and love. 

Stills from video exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER

If You Build a Wall Divide your Flag, 1999

Location: Usto nad Labem, Czech Republic

This performance was created as a culmination of protest actions against Xenophobia and Racism in Usti nad Labem.   Kohout sited an infamous outdoor wall that was built on October 13, 1999 that was intended to separate the Romani-Czech from the White-Czech communities. Kohout created this piece on November 17, the 10th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution (which supposedly established a democratic society in the Czech Republic).   The media awaited a counter-action to the commemoration, for which Kohout was prepared. Helped by his friend, Vladimir Libal, Kohout painted a Czech flag on a large piece of plywood. Placing it next to the wall, Kohout proceeded to saw the flag in half. Libal and Kohout placed one piece on each side of the wall to symbolize the divisions in Czech society.  That evening, all the Czech TV stations and some world media outlets (including the BBC and CNN), reported news of the performance.  This is media documentation from the action.
Due to protests, city officials removed the wall approximately 6 weeks later.  

The Cage, 2000

Location: Train Station in Boston, MA

During rush hour, Kohout stood in a cage in the main hall of the largest Boston railway station.  As the station bustled with commuters making their way home from their jobs in Boston’s Financial District, Kohout addressed passersby in a serious, neutral voice.  He explained why he was inside a cage, stating:

"Once there was a reason to keep me inside of the cage all the time because I was an unreasonable critic of the capitalist system.   That time is over, and now I want to win your trust because I have accepted the capitalist market system and recognize that system to be the best one in the history of humankind.”

Kohout repeatedly asked for their forgiveness, asking passersby to let him “be as free, truthful and honest as they were.”

This sarcastic dialogue elicited a range of reactions from passersby that encountered this infiltration.  

The Strangers are Approaching the City, Close the Gates, 2001
Location: Zadar, Croatia

Kohout devoted this piece to the local Roma (Gypsies), who fled for their lives from Zadar (Croatia) when the war between Croats and Serbs began in 1991. This war resulted in multiple cases of ethnic cleaning of “non-Croatians”.

In this piece, Kohout mimicked a significant monument in Zadar that was easily recognized by locals.  The monument located in the middle of the city consists of a tower with a sculpture of an angel standing on top. In medieval times, the city of Zadar was surrounded tall walls and this tower served as a post for an observer.  The observer would scream to alert the town when strangers approached the city.  The city gate would then be closed, preventing the strangers’ entry.  Kohout chose a nearby tower as the site for his work.  Standing on top of this tower, he screamed the following phrase repeatedly in Croatian: “THE STRANGERS ARE APPROACHING THE CITY, CLOSE THE GATES!”  For an hour, Kohout’s voice traveled throughout the city, causing passersby to pause and watch.  

video documentation exhibited at INSIDER/OUTSIDER

Locations: 2 locations in New York City, Belfast, 2 locations in Berlin, London, Beijing, Orlando, Szezecin, Mannheim, Bern, Washington D.C., Toronto, Melbourne, and Cardiff

Questioning the controversial enterprise of public art, Byrd began an 8-year piece that he implemented in multiple cities around the world.  Proponents of public art often see it as an altruistic means of bringing aesthetic enlightenment to the masses.  Critics sometimes view public art as unwelcome (and often large) objects being permanently plopped into public spaces.  Witnessing the increasing popularity of this movement in art, Byrd began to wonder if it was possible for artists to tread lightly in the public sphere.  He continued to ask if it is possible for an artist to mark a space unobtrusively.  Does such a covert action have any value?  Can it even be called art if no one knows about it?

From 2004-2012, Byrd placed small sheets of gold leaf in various locations across the planet. At each site, he tried not to draw attention to himself in any way.  Sometimes the gold leaf would stick to the site, other times, the wind would catch the gossamer material.  In the case of the latter, Byrd would follow the gold leaf until it came to rest or disappeared.

Stills from video exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER

Location: Tel Aviv, Israel

For 5 days and nights, Kunda lived in a bomb shelter that is situated in a neighborhood park in north  Tel Aviv.  The shelter had once served as an artists’ exhibition space, but was vacated in preparation for the Gulf war.  Kunda created a series of spontaneous actions in response to the physical environment and the materials at hand.  The space became a place where she explored the border zone between “normal life” and “emergency life”. 

Kunda responded to living in this self-imposed isolation by engaging in actions that confronted the complex range of emotions she experienced in this state.  Her actions addressed loneliness, claustrophobia, fear, and the threat of potential impending destruction. The moments that she peeked out at the world above ground and saw people engaged in in their everyday life felt surreal.  Kunda began to view these activities as a vision of normalcy that would soon dissolve.  In City Shelter, Kunda found herself living in a different reality. Being isolated for 5 days made the artist aware of the nuances of the space.  She had time to get to know the place through creative action.  Her activities shifted from serious to playful, and then to mystical, as if she were in a monk’s cell, moving through different stages of meditation and prayer.  In the end, Kunda found familiarity in the shelter.  It became “home” to her. 

At the end of the 5 days, she opened up the space as an installation that included Polaroid films she had taken, videos that recorded her while she was sleeping, remnants of the actions, and other signs that she had been living there.

Stills from video exhibited in INSIDER/OUTSIDER