Malady

Malady is a body of work grounded in a conceptual framework which imagines an infinite number of invisible layers within and without all things, analogous to a functioning microbiome in which unnameable phenomena and infinite rationalities exist as functioning organisms. It is here where art can be treated as a practice of medicine: dissecting, healing, and recording observation in simultaneous fashion. The works displayed in Malady are a further investigation of this practice with a focus on the intricacies of sickness, the transformative powers of decay and preservation, and the manner in which states of perception can warp and shift in a fluid manner. These works function as a search to expose invisible presence in the same manner that rubbings reveal inscriptions and a match held behind a paper reveals invisible writing. Unseen connections are affirmed and followed to identify and further explore their meaning within the larger networks at hand. Coincidence, recurrence, and visual conversation are welcomed to ensure an effective and organic process.

Over the course of their creation these pieces received attention nearly every day for hours, becoming living documents which trapped thought and occurrence and manifested them slowly over time like cultures in a petri dish. They are saturated with work and warped with time and touch, pinned to the wall as still-living specimens. While works in this practice most typically take shape from a vantage point that is divorced from the events which lead to its conceptualization and operate with the benefit of perspective, events occurred during this piece’s creation that both repeated and mirrored the conceptual incipience and thematic focus of this work. This led to a unique position of the work acting both as the closing of one chapter and the beginning of a transformation in concept which will carry further works into the galleries to come.