Spring 2011

"Torn Map House" was a week-long installation and transaction that attempted to invert the conventional relationship between audience and site, between my work and site, between myself and site. Both as a fleeting shelter and a studio, the gallery space offered opportunities for public transactions: a tea house, an invitation to draw an onion and place it in a suitcase, the occasion to bring a vessel of some kind and have your portrait taken while holding it, to barter for art, materials, food and books (a take it or leave it system), and to view and take part in performance: sawing the mattress in half, being wrapped in a cocoon of rope and sealing a suitcase with wax.

Throughout the week, I made an effort to be as present in the gallery as possible: burning incense, playing music, drawing my share of onions on a slate tablet, eating and sharing food, reading and writing while seated on a mat on the floor; I practiced yoga, changed my clothing, and placed the peels and casings of clementines and edamame on the window ledge. One of my favorite moments of this show was when alandscape architect came by and adorned the arc of a kiln shelf with lettuce from her lunch in exchange for a necklace I had made from rusted compression stems and copper cable.