Saturday, April 25, 2009

Kernel and Cleanse













Title: Kernel
Size: 28” X 5 ½” X 3”
Date: 04/09
Media: Sculpture
Materials: Wood, soap, ceramic, and, stainless steel soap dishes.

Description:
The Kernel of Truth remains, enduring in the residue of every old lie.

Following events involving deception from family members I started trying to decide how I would sculpt a lie. Deciding what physical form deceit would take was not an easy task. Through brainstorming I came to the play on words lye/lie soap. It seamed to be the perfect marriage of pun and concept. Creating the lie from, you guessed it, soap was the obvious first choice and after wading through twelve different materials it was clearly the right option. Many other materials brought with them interesting textures and connotations but none came close to matching the weak, easily dissolved, translucency of actual soap. I chose ceramic for the titular Kernel of truth within the lie. I found no better material to articulate the permanent, hard truth. As the lie wears away, becoming more and more transparent, this would always be left behind, enduring. As for the final form the artwork takes, I again went through many possibilities. Most of them became very bulky very quickly. The very simple concept became overwhelmed easily by too much unnecessary information. To find the most elegant solution editing became paramount. In Kernel, instead of incorporating every step, I chose to include only the beginning and end of the story as objects. On the left a new lie sits on a pristine dish with only a hint of what’s inside visible. To the right the dish carries only the kernel sitting unflinchingly on the residue of the used up lie.


Title: Cleanse
Size: Dimensions Variable, 3 min. loop
Date: 04/09
Media: Video
Materials: Hands, soap, water, and sink.

Description:
Endless is the attempt to stay clean after a fraudulent act. In Cleanse, a looped video seemed the ideal medium to demonstrate this effort. Projected ethereally nearby Kernel, a pair of hands works compulsively to try to sanitize themselves. This video informs the objects in Kernel as a sort of middle step.


In their adjacent installation the two work in concert to convey a unified thought.

2 comments:

Sarah Layne said...

Hey Ron,
Cool work. The pop tart piece made me laugh. I think if I were eating pop tarts in space, they would look something like that. Thanks for your interest in my work, by the way! I'm happy it will find a new home.

Hollingshead said...

Thanks Sarah, I am very happy with where my work is going right now. PopTarts in space. Yum!