Laurie Beth Clark
University of Wisconsin-Madison Professor of Art (4-D).
For more information, visit LaurieBethClark.art
Trina May Smith
Interstice
As you enter the gallery, you can see a glowing grid and there is a base heavy sound that fills the room and gets into your bones. It sort of lures you in and you are compelled to move closer. As you get closer there is a projection on the floor that you couldn’t see from a distance. The projection is a random loop of war images. There are bombs going off, people in face masks, heavy machinery etc. The projection on the wall is constantly shifting. The same images that are on the floor are distorted layered randomly in various sizes. You can not tell at all what the images are on the wall but they relate by color etc. to the floor images. There are 800 plaster squares that make up the pattern on the wall and floor. The paper airplanes that the projection is going through cast shadows on the floor and wall and create an ominous feel. The audio is of a helicopter blade slowed down to about the speed of a heartbeat and there is also a sort of distant sounding higher pitched tone that is reminiscent of a war siren that fades in and out. The pattern speaks of the underlying way that happenings such as war cycle through our societies. In addition the pattern on the wall has a digital feel, which speaks to the notion of how information is presented through the media. The images on the floor are the reality of what is happening…