Dwelling

“Everybody’s a critic,” well that’s because everybody’s an artist. Reviewing art is sometimes challenging, you wonder what inspires this artist, or how did the artist come up with the concept? You try to be open-minded, and take the time to see beauty in everything. Recently I got a chance to dwell in the 33 E. Congress building’s exhibit entitled Dwelling and caught up with different interpretations of art in general.

Usually, when thinking of expression my mind can go everywhere, but in this case I felt like I caught a case of small-minded syndrome. I walked around the exhibit one quick time, and hated everything. I wondered what exactly were these artists doing. I wondered if most of the mediums were finished, and couldn’t wrap my head around any until I walked back out of the exhibit, and grabbed one of the advertisements for the exhibit. The title read “Dwelling,” and the super cool photograph on it made me want to take another look, so I did.

Walking back into the show I finally took the time to see every presentation. One of my favorite parts of the showing was Carrie Schneider’s family videos. At first I was taken aback by it, I didn’t know what I was supposed to get from it, but they all depicted something we can all relate to. “Mom’s Lap,” was my favorite. The video portrayed a daughter feeling safe near her mom. For those of us fortunate to have mothers find a safety net in our mother’s. Even though there were no faces, just two bodies cuddled next to each other. A nostalgic feeling came over me when watching that short film. Her other videos, also gave me nostalgia.

An artist that was kind of hard to interpret was Olga Chernysheva’s “Windows.” She had two short films that followed a man around his apartment. I wondered why she chose him? I found it hard to get into this interpretation of dwelling. Another artist that I found hard to interpret was Ginny Huo “Corrugated Roof,” it was interesting, but it seemed unfinished. I felt that there should’ve been a little more, like a roof attached to a house, it left so much to the imagination, which isn’t always a good thing.

Most of the exhibit was fulfilling, but at the same time unfinished. I felt like some of the artists were lazy, and made simplicity somewhat of a bad thing. Emily Hunt was way to simple and her polaroid’s didn’t really say much about dwelling.  One of my favorite artists in the exhibit would have to be Heather Boaz. Her simplistic displays told a story, yet both only consisted of two items. “Escape” consisted of a long white sheet attached to a window, and this one simple gesture told any story you could ponder up in your head. Her other depiction, “Defense” which was a chair placed under a doorknob also let my imagination run wild.

I didn’t really get a clear sense of who some of the artists were, yet I did enjoy most of it, but I had to really understand the title and the imagery most of them were using. I think the exhibit had a little something for everyone, from photography like Anna Katherine Peter’s “Memory Archive” which was amazing. Her 200 photos were all purposefully placed together.  There’s also short video films, and steps to make a dress. The display was tasteful, but when walking into Dwelling just remember to keep an open mind, I don’t really have a thumbs up or down, my thumb is pointing to the side. 

-Gina