Jane Wang & Karen Aqua - installations

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photo: Bob Raymond (MAG)

Karen Aqua/Jane Wang
"Meditation on The Politics of Shoes" mixed media

shoes and death
shoe bombs
cancer cells radiation skulls animation/cartoons cute fuzzy animals?
vicious animals?
violence in Sunday morning cartoons?

shoes flung over telephone wires...
is it about ennui in youth
is it about something as innocuous as getting a new pair of shoes?
is it a neon sign saying“drugs here”?
is it about gangs and territory?
is it about someone died here/a child's sneakers?
could you fry if you touched a live telephone wire?

white for bones, red for bodies which have been skinned alive









photos: Bob Raymond (MAG)

Jane Wang
"Giant Red Ruby Shoe"
electrical wire installation (outside on patio)

"Keep tight inside of them -- their magic must be very powerful, or she wouldn't want them so badly!"
- from the Wizard of Oz film with Judy Garland

Lermontov: When we first met ... you asked me a question to which I gave a stupid answer, you asked me whether I wanted to live and I said "Yes". Actually, Miss Page, I want more, much more. I want to create, to make something big out of something little – to make a great dancer out of you. But first, I must ask you the same question, what do you want from life? To live?

Vicky: To dance.
- from the Michael Powell film “The Red Shoes”

“Dance you shall,” said he, “dance in your red shoes till you are pale and cold, till your skin shrivels up and you are a skeleton! Dance you shall, from door to door, and where proud and wicked children live you shall knock, so that they may hear you and fear you! Dance you shall, dance—!”
- from Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tale “The Red Shoes”

"Something about the power of ruby/red footwear – either to empower or overpower the wearer. It's strange that both although the ruby slippers and the red shoes ostensibly represented these two very different kinds of power, the end result was similar - for wasn't Dorothy flung back (even though through her own will) from a dreamland in lurid color to an arid, Grapes of Wrath type existence in black and white – a kind of living death? And in both cases, one could only remove the red shoes/ruby slippers by dying.

Isn't that kind of weird that so many children's stories turn out to be about death?"



Jane Wang is a member of the Mobius Artists Group. Although she primarily composes music for dance, theater and performance art theater-based work, her principal instruments being double bass, piano and toy pianos, she has recently returned to her on-going love of sculpture and 3-dimensional structures. Inspired in part by the touring exhibition, Radical Lace and Subversive Knitting, and the performance artist Hanne Tierney who she frequently collaborates with, she started working in the medium of wire to create large sculptures.

http://www.myspace.com/janewangcomposer

Leigh Waldron-Taylor - “I dream of boots and an army of women”

photos: Bob Raymond (MAG)

Leigh Waldron-Taylor
“I dream of boots and an army of women”
mixed media installation

Original intention was to place a very tall aluminum ladder resting against the window. Pairs of varied types of women's boots are placed around the base of the ladder enclosing and encircling it.

The artist states in an email to the curator:

"In my perfect world, the ladder would be an unextended aluminum extension ladder affixed to the floor invisibly with very strong double-sided tape and the top resting against the window. I would put some soft material such as fleece invisibly between the metal and glass to protect the window. The boots would surround and fill in the space at the bottom of the ladder to form a circle. That's what I see in my mind's eye.

That said, the height of the ladder issue is important and an interesting challenge to be reconciled as I think about it and your suggestions. There's a solution somewhere"

Leigh Waldron-Taylor explores what is the same but different through various genre and media. Leigh’s recent work is conceptual and organized as performative installation in which anything is up for scrutiny and rendered in any way possible. This represents a movement away from work done previously which focused on visual representation via painting and printmaking. Leigh has studied in Providence, Toronto, and Provincetown and exhibited in Boston, Toronto, Provincetown, Berlin, and San Francisco.

http://leighwaldrontaylor.com

Notes from the Curator:

1. A few visitors to the exhibit said they wished that the artist hadn't divulged so much of the process in her statement about her work. I told them that that was entirely my fault. Actually the artist hadn't really said anything in particular about her work, other than the title. I was the one who was fascinated by the process of how to take an initial thought and transform it into reality.

All that said, everyone had different interpretations of what the installation and "dream" was about. Some thought all the shoes/boots belonged to the same person and perhaps it was a commentary on the excess of shoes and upward mobility. Others thought it might be something about going to heaven especially after I revealed that the artist said that since she had found many of the more ornate high heeled shoes at second hand shops or estate sales, perhaps some of the shoes were from elderly ladies who had passed away. If one interpreted the piece that way, it's interesting to note that the boots, which might represent the working class, are closer to the ladder and the more ornate shoes, perhaps representing the aristocracy, fall further behind. Finally, I must confess that when the artist first mentioned "army of boots", I wasn't sure if this might be some kind of "support our women in the armed forces tribute" of some kind.

The artist never revealed to me what the true meaning underlying her work meant to her. Perhaps that is best and as she intended.

2. I especially loved how beautiful this installation looked at night with the shadow play of the ladder against the white pole. Sara June in her two performances made use visually of the artist's installation and had encounters with some of the shoes. Fortunately Leigh was fine with having her shoes and boots moved around during the performances and wasn't attached to a particular arrangement even during the ensuing exhibit.

Sam Tan - "63 in '08" installation

Video stills and photos showing gradual
disintegration of Sam Tan's "63 in '08"
Variation and Original Concept:
unless noted otherwise, all photos taken by Bob Raymond (MAG)

Day 1: Curator forgot to move chairs around installation
(video still)

Day 2: Rectangle still remains intact
(video still)

Day 3: Showing chalk puddles and initial installation

Sam Tan
“63 in '08”
site-specific installation

There were 63 homicides in Boston in 2008. The installation offers the opportunity for the viewer to question oneself the degree of connectedness to such crimes in the city as well as ruminate on ways that everyone could help to lower violent crimes in the future.

Sam Tan is an emerging artist who is based in the Boston area and he has been exhibiting extensively for the past eight years. He currently has works in The Boston Drawing Project at Carroll and Sons Gallery in Boston, as well as Pierogi Flat Files in Brooklyn. He recently had a solo exhibition at the Artists Foundation Gallery in Boston. Tan’s works have entered into private and corporate collections, and have been acquired by public companies. He has been awarded scholarships from the Bertha Walker Foundation and his works have been published in various publications, including the Harvard Advocate.

Note from the Curator:
1. I have to confess that I loved the artist's initial concept of the 63 chalk puddles (as we both called them) on the floor. When the artist proposed a variation on his initial submission, I said, why not do both and said we could get some extra people to help create the puddles (which in reality turned out to be David Chin of course) if we could install the puddles on Monday right before the evening's performances. My hope was that someone would make use of the puddles in their performance. As it turned out, Monday had fewer performances (and shorter ones - being almost all dance/movement/butoh oriented) so I decided to perform myself with the intent of doing something meditative with the puddles. Once again, events transmogrified as I also wanted Karen Klein's installation to be destroyed. How these disparate actions were accomplished was revealed and described at some length in a previous post (Karen Klein - June 12 2009 ).

(video still)

2. In case there is some confusion about this, Sam Tan installed two versions of his concept. The first was actually a variation on his original proposal. It is the installation of the names on acetate enclosed by a red frame on the window with a rectangle of white chalk on the floor. The second is 63 chalk puddles on the gallery floor which he installed (with help from David Chin) during the afternoon of Monday May 25 2009.

Comments from Visitor's Book:

"63 in '08 seemed very heartwrenching for me - the transparency on the window with tiny black text of deaths (so how come so many in Dorchester??) yet, as you read the names my eyes also took in the flowering shrubs outside and the beautiful blue flowers. Why is it like this?"

"63 in '08 is powerful. The chalk (now dispersed) on the floor reminds me of ground drawing in voodoo ceremonies for spirits that are carefully created (hours of work) and then erased/dispersed in an instant when the actual ceremony begins and people dance over/through them. Such are the momentary portals between the living and the dead/spirits"

Links:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/samtan
http://www.flickr.com/photos/artistinmass2/

Ival Stratford-Kovner (CT) - "Voting Shoes 1970's Edition #2

video still

photo: Bob Raymond (MAG)

Ival Stratford-Kovner (CT)
"Voting Shoes 1970's Edition #2
mixed media installation

"I was studying at Boston University College of Fine Arts and living in Cambridge with eight other artists/architects/students when the presidential elections rolled around. We were voting for president of the United States for the first time in our lives and I was voting for the first time ever. I was eager to feel this important step in my life and decided to hand paint my pump shoes - stripes of red and white with big, white stars on a field of blue - on both shoes. I recall that the day of the election the town mothers looked a little bewildered by the fact that we'd also painted our faces, red, white and blue. Years later, I would be a poll checker at that same election site when I worked for Carolyn Mugar's late husband who was then running for Congress. Many decades had passed by the excitement of that first election remained in my mind clearly. I was asked to join a show with twelve women called "Fitting" and I thought of how I fit into those shoes each time I voted - wearing them proudly in various states where I'd lived over the years. My fellow artists could not believe I still had the shoes -and they ended up in our show - now formally presented within a white box with flag and wooden stars. I have made many assemblages as well as my large format oil paintings over the years - and one small box was called "Little Dig" about our big dig in Boston - with monopoly pieces of battleships glued on the inside lid with small hotrod pieces driving through a white bone within the box.”
Ival Stratford-Kovner has a BFA from Boston University, MS, MFA, from Western Connecticut University Ival is a certified Art Teacher in Massachusetts, also in Computer Graphics/Web Design (Clark U.), and has an Arts Management Certification (UMass Amherst). She was awarded a fellowship in 2006 and 2008 from the Vermont Studio Center. Ival has taught at Rivier College, Newbury College, Bunker Hill Community College, Harvard GSD (faculty workshop offered), BU (alumni drawing), WCSU. She is currently with the Cavalry Trooper of 2nd Co. Governor's Horse Guard, studying hippo therapy and equine riding therapy for NAHRA certification. Ival has had solo exhibitions internationally & nationally including: Milan, Italy, Ukraine, San Diego, Nashville, NYC, Boston, NH, Maine etc.

This installation were generously offered for sale by the artist. 100% of the proceeds were donated to Mobius.

Anne Stanner - "If the Shoe Doesn't Fit, Wear It Anyway?"

photos: Bob Raymond (MAG)

video still

Anne Stanner (NYC)
"If the Shoe Doesn't Fit, Wear It Anyway?"
mixed media

"This is a welded woman's high heel shoe, life size, created with welding rod, sort of like a fanciful cage, and a copper piece for the heel. Inserted inside is an old wooden shoe stretcher with a metal handle. I think of this as a commentary on the pain and discomfort, as well as lack of full mobility (ie, ability to run) that women have had to endure in order to seem fashionable and more attractive."

"I have worked in metal sculpture for over 25 years, and have been a technical instructor in the Art Students League of NY’s metal program since 2003. I also taught art in New York City public schools and served as an assistant welding instructor at the Educational Alliance Art School. I have also more recently created figurative sculpture in clay, plaster and concrete. Professional affiliations include the Sculptors Alliance, Inc. (President), the New York Society of Women Artists (Vice President), and the City College of New York Art Alumni (Treasurer). I have curated group exhibitions at the Theatre for the New City and Third Street Music School. I have held one-person exhibitions at the Ellenville (NY) Public Library and Museum, Pace University, Long Island University and the City College of New York. Two-person exhibits include The Brooklyn YWCA and Middlesex County College (NJ). I participated in numerous group shows in galleries and other venues including the Godwin-Ternbach Museum at Queens College, Pleiades Gallery, Noho Gallery, Broome Street Gallery, 2/20 Gallery, Salmagundi Club, Cork Gallery at Lincoln Center, Pfizer, Inc., and A.I.R. Gallery, all in New York City, and Bertoni Gallery in Sugar Loaf, NY, Northern Westchester Center for the Arts, Hopper House Art Center in Nyack, NY, Kleinert Gallery in Woodstock, NY, Flinn Gallery in Greenwich, Conn. I have an MFA from the City College of New York."

work can be seen on the following group website:
www.nyartistscircle.org/artists/stanner/stanner.html

John Murphree - installation & action May 23-25 2009

video stills

photo: Bob Raymond (MAG)

photo: Bob Raymond (MAG)

John Murphree
"Cultural Juxtaposition"
steel gongs and rack installation

John Murphree - Action for The Politics of Shoes @mobius from MobiusArtistsGroup on Vimeo.

This clip was taken at the Monday May 25, 2009 (Memorial Day Observed in the US in 2009) evening of performances.

Viewers are encouraged to take off their shoes and throw them at the gongs! The act of throwing a (probably) Chinese made American icon (the tennis shoe) at an American made chinese icon is the impetus of this piece.

John Murphree makes his home in Medford with his wife Jeanna Allegrone. He studied composition at the Berklee College of Music, B.M. and recently completed his master's in composition at the Boston Conservatory. Through collaborations with the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, John has begun making bowed sculptures whose purpose is to explore the transfiguration of artistic energy into musical output.

Notes from the Curator:

1. I had heard about John Murphree through Juddertone, as he is one of the artists selected for the 2009 Juddertone ning forum and concerts. He had posted the video below on the Juddertone ning site as an example of one of his previous works so I immediately contacted him about creating an installation for The Politics of Shoes. He said that he wouldn't be able to create a new piece in time for the exhibit (since it was less than 3 weeks away at that point) so I asked him about what completed pieces he had which might fit the theme whereupon he described a rack of gongs that his housemates threw their shoes at when they had a rough day or just for the hell of it. Of course I said perfect! At the last minute, John called me and said he was having second thoughts about bringing his piece because he thought thematically perhaps his piece didn't fit into the show to which I responded with horror - no PLEASE! I have to have your piece in the show. Fortunately John brought his installation to be part of the exhibit and series of performances. It turned out to be one of the performance audience and exhibition favorites.


Find more videos like this on juddertone


2. From the book of comments at the exhibit:

"Love the gongs - very therapeutic!"
"Felt so good to throw shoes at the gong (sounded great too)!"
"Also, the metal panels were fun!"

3. Most of the visitors to the exhibit had to be encouraged to throw their own or Karen Klein's (who had offered up her beautiful sequined high heeled shoes up for sacrifice) at the gongs; once they felt free to do so, without exception, everyone really got into the action and often laughed or looked supremely happy once they had experienced the gongs. Other than visitors who had written their comments in the book, these two visitors' experiences were particularly memorable:

- An elegantly dressed artist with an Australian accent came dashing into the exhibit right before the show was due to come down. She told me that she had driven down from Newburyport (an hour or so north of Boston) to see the exhibit. When I offered her Karen Klein's shoes to throw at the gongs, she really went at the gongs with such relish and ferocity that I wish I had taken a video of her. It was simultaneously wonderful and alarming.

- Maggie Nowinski came to deinstall Burns Maxey's and her video installation (which the same elegant artist above had also enjoyed immensely and was the only person who I had heard laugh out loud while watching the video). Maggie took some time to walk around and view each installation carefully. She looked at the gongs and read the artist's statement and I told her she was welcome to throw her shoes at the gongs. She said that she couldn't throw her sneakers at the gongs because they weren't Made in China and perhaps it would go against the artist's intent. I then had to confess that I had begged John for his rack of gongs and he had kindly come up with his statement as a way of "justifying" the gong's presence in the exhibit and that I knew that John was fine with people hurling shoes of any country of origin at his gongs.

4. The curator takes a moment to play the gongs:

Improvisation using john Murphree's Gongs @mobius from Jane Wang on Vimeo.

5. I had decided that the safest place for the gongs was in front of the handicap ramp leading up to the second level of the gallery space since there were no windows or fragile installation in "firing" range of the gongs. During the performances, one 9 year old girl threw her shoes so wildly that she almost hit one of the windows and another artist managed to throw her shoe directly between two gongs which is much more difficult than hitting one of the gongs. Much deserved kudos to both participants.

6. Please note that although John Murphree is principally known as a composer, he also makes instruments - he welded the gongs which he sells individually or in sets if you are interested (the Curator bought two of the artist's gongs). You may contact him directly via his website:

www.johnmurphree.com

Gwen Murphy - Lonely Wooden Tower

video clip: Jane Wang (MAG)

photo: Bob Raymond

video clip: Jane Wang (MAG)

Gwen Murphy
"Lonely Wooden Tower"
wall sculpture

"Lonely Wooden Tower" is an image of the feet of Christ and looks at the crucifixion as supreme personal sacrifice and as political assassination.

The artist stated in an email to the Curator:
"I'm very happy to be able to show "Lonely Wooden Tower" (Christ's feet). It's exciting and a little scary. As a figurative sculptor, I feel like never portraying the crucifixion would be like a song writer never writing a song about a broken heart. I was raised Christian, but I no longer have beliefs about the literal truth of Christ's life. I see Christ's life it as a powerful series of messages (like forgiveness). I sincerely hope not to offend anyone, but if a work of art doesn't disturb just a little, or at least surprise, then it's not an aesthetic experience, it's anesthetic."

Gwen Murphy is a sculptor living in Acton, Ma., with a studio at Art Space Maynard. She has been making figurative sculpture for over twenty years. Ms. Murphy received a BA in fine arts from New College of Florida, and an MFA in sculpture from Boston University College of Fine Arts. She has taught and exhibited in museums & galleries throughout New England and New York. Her most recent work has been the "Foot Fetish" series of shoe sculptures. Photographs of her sculptures may be viewed online on her website: www.gwenmurphy.blogspot.com

Email from the Curator to the artist:
"I did want to tell you that many many people commented on how beautiful and moving your piece is. And several were trying to figure out what material it was made of and how you constructed it ( some thought it was wood, some thought it was ceramic or clay - maybe they thought the title was allegorical?)

When my friend who was a minister and now is a full time free-lance journalist came to see the show, he asked me if he should look at the work in any particular order and I said no, just however he wished. I was working on my laptop while he was walking around and when I looked up, I saw that the first installation which he gravitated to was yours! I had to tease him about that saying "Jeff, you picked the one installation that was about religion".

Thanks again for your beautiful piece."

Lauren McCarthy - Dress Shoes for Spontaneous Departure

photo: Bob Raymond (MAG)






video clips: J. Wang (MAG)

Lauren McCarthy
Dress Shoes for Spontaneous Departure
interactive sculpture

The work is a pair of shoes that allows the wearer to exist simultaneously in formal and non-formal social situations. An ordinary pair of running shoes have been transformed through decoration and the addition of hinged heels. The heels can be folded down to function as heeled dress shoes, or folded up to lay flat and function as running shoes. The transformable qualities of the shoes provide the wearer the freedom of spontaenous movement while maintaining the ability to conform to formal dress situations.

Viewers are invited to try on the shoes and experience their function as convertible dress and running shoes.

Lauren McCarthy is a designer, artist, and programmer currently living in Cambridge, MA. She recently graduated from MIT with degrees in visual arts and computer science. Her work explores the structures, systems, and boundaries of different social spaces, and the way that these affect our relationships with our physical bodies. Participants are invited to interact, experience, and question through participatory interventions that require both physical and mental engagement. She also works as a designer at Small Design Firm, creating interactive installations and media environments for various museums and institutions, including the Visitor's Center at Monticello, the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Links:

lauren-mccarthy.com/bodyextension.html
lauren-mccarthy.com/networkout/networkout.html
lauren-mccarthy.com/ushmm.html
(more work here) lauren-mccarthy.com/projects.html
www.lauren-mccarthy.com


You can see how these shoes work by viewing this 39 second excerpt

Karen Klein - "Brand Names installation artist

photos: Bob Raymond

Karen Klein
"Brand Names"
cedar, styrofoam, cardboard, paper, mixed media

The purpose of this installation is to call attention to the comodification of shoes and of art. The artist states that her work: “It is not part of any performance, but could be destroyed during a performance, or persons, could throw their shoes at the tower of shoe boxes, if they wished.”

Karen Klein is a visual artist and a dancer. As an artist, she makes wood and wire sculptures, installations, and ink drawings. A member of New England Sculptors and Studios Without Walls, she has had eight solo exhibitions and been in numerous juried and invitational shows. As a dancer, she is a member of Prometheus Dance Elders Ensemble and has also performed in works choreographed by Daniel McCusker, Emily Beattie, and Kee Chin.

www.nesculptors.com
www.gallery333.com

Notes from the curator:

1. The small cedar shoe was hand carved by the artist.

2. Karen Klein generously donated the entire installation to Mobius including the cedar shoe and the sequined high heeled shoes which were used to activate John Murphree's gong installation by various performers, audience members and visitors to the exhibit. The artist said her days of wearing the sequined shoes are long over and if anyone can fit into them and would like them, they are welcome to them. Needless to say, the curator kept the cedar shoe as a memento of The Politics of Shoes.

How Karen Klein's installation was used in performance:
If you want to experience a sped up version of what the audience experienced, watch Video #1.
If you'd just like to skip directly to where Karen Klein's is actually "manipulated", watch Video #2.

Video #1:

Moving Sound Meditation on Sam Tan's '63 in '08" The Politics of Shoes @mobius - Shorter version 7:20 mins from MobiusArtistsGroup on Vimeo.

** SPOILER WARNING - VIDEO #2 and DISCUSSION BELOW **




Video #2:

Performance vs. Theater discussion:

The destruction of the artist's installation was referenced in a discussion amongst members of the Mobius Artists Group. I've included the salient points here:

From Margaret Bellafiore to the group in answer to Tom Plsek's question:
"RE answering the question:Theatre and/vs? Performance, the range of answers would be quite personal, I would think. For me, I find Performance converges with life, or "life" or LIFE, while Theatre, for the most part, does not, though sometimes it does. (!) I can think of a very recent example, where there seemed to be a convergence of Theatre, Performance and Life. Last night, Jane was dragging bells in the space in an improvisational way ( aha, improv seems more a part of Performance and not Theatre, again for the most part). Then another "performer and/or actor" (Karen Klein, I believe) charged into the space from outside wearing a wig and carring a large bright red pocketbook. She proceeded to smash up a small installation swinging that red bag, beating it to smithereens ( aha, the presence of smithereens might be key part of Performance or perhaps Theatre, or perhaps both!) Then, she left, storming out the front door. All during this time, Jane continued to drag bells. It seemed to me, that tit was the interaction of the two women in the space that felt like performance because it seemed neither one really knew (I assume) what the other was going to do next. (The actions of Karen if she had done it alone felt like Theatre.) Before I delete all of the above, as I am realizing I can't aswer your question-- I do want to note what felt last night like 100% Performance: Some people were walking outside the space on the sidewalk during some movement actions and stopped to gawk through the windows at the patio end. Then, they really started to pay attention and began slowly walking to the other side, watching and slowly becoming part of the piece inside. When they reached the far end, they waved and clapped and the audience inside did the same. Those moments of unpredictability and convergence: is that it? AHHHH!"

From Jane Wang to the group:
"hi all. would you believe that was actually Liz Roncka and also the piece being smashed was by Karen Klein (who is also a dancer a strange coincidence no?) i was originally going to just do a SHORT walk thru the gallery somewhat serious and somber even with my stupid wild outfit but i was thinking rashomon or some other trippy japanese film... but then the night before i told liz, longingly - that karen really wanted someone to destroy her piece (and i really wanted someone to do it) so liz said - ok i'll do it -- and then she came up with the idea of running in and smashing the thing and running out... she was further fueled by Haggai (the musician she performed with on Sat and Sun) basically saying he didn't believe she would do it -- a DARE if you wish... we thought about whose performance she could interrupt and then i thought well maybe i'll turn my piece into a durational "waiting for liz " piece and make it deliberately long and dreary and when will this stupid thing be over already... but that doesn't answer tom's question either... (-:"

video credits: Charles Daniels, Matt Samolis, Liz Roncka, Jane Wang

Email from Karen Klein - June 14, 2009:
"I loved seeing the video--you draped like some ancient figure and Liz romping through my installation. Also loved how she used the actual shoes as weapons. That made me realize that we do use shoes as weapons. Think of Nancy Sinatra's "These boots are made for walkin'" for the gender wars and the jackboots of thugs and paramilitaries who kick folks into submission. Our term 'kick ass' hides the shoe image but implies it."

Kate Hanrahan - "The Drowned Children"

#1 - BEFORE artist reset piece ...........#2 - AFTER artist reset piece








photos: Bob Raymond (MAG)


Kate Hanrahan (Brooklyn, NY)
“The Drowned Children”
mixed media installation

The artist wrote:

"I have been working on a series called “The Drowned Children”. It encompasses the effects of war on children as well as today’s political and societal effects.

This piece focuses on the recent war waged by Israel against the Gaza Strip which has resulted in the deaths of 1434 Palestinians. These deaths included 960 civilians, among these were 437 children under the age of 16, 110 women and 123 elderly, in addition to 14 doctors and four reporters. These statistics show that the number of children who died amounted to more than 45% of the total number of civilian casualties of the war. Nearly 1500 children have joined the already lengthy list of orphans in Gaza.

The installation is an old, dilapidated wooden chair, with white painted, children shoes piled on the seat. Distorted, silver forks file down stuck through the shoes. Part of the bottom of the seat is broken through where a single shoe lace hangs down bound around a dangling silver fork."

Kate Hanrahan was born in Pennsylvania. She received a Bachelor's of Fine Arts in Painting from the Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah, Georgia also studying on their campuses in Lacoste, France and Atlanta, Georgia. She is currently living and working Brooklyn, New York. In the last two years she has been pursuing her painting, installation work, performance pieces and experimental video to explore the psychological effects of war and society on children. Memory, loss of life, and loss of innocence are common themes in her mainly figurative work.

coroflot.com/whiteshoes


Note from the Curator:

During the first evening of performances, the installation had to be moved slightly. I hadn't had the foresight to take a photo of exactly how Ms. Hanrahan had installed her piece so when the artist came to de-install, she noticed that it was not exactly as she had set it. Fortunately, she was willing to reset her piece and Bob Raymond took several photographs of the installation as originally intended before she had to take her piece back to Brooklyn on May 25th.

For the remainder of the exhibit, with the artist's consent, two photographs of "The Drowned Children" were placed in the windows adjacent to the corner shown in the photograph labelled:
#2 - AFTER artist reset piece