Barriers questions the nature of obstructions, limits, and controls on personal and intercultural interactions. It is set up to provide several physical barriers, both visual and auditory through which the viewer has to navigate in order to experience the piece. Gates made of stainless steel wire cloth are the first obstacle. They are both seductive in their shimmering presence and repellant in the metallic nature of their materials. They act as a scrim, obscuring the interior of the gallery when light is brighter outside, and inviting the viewer in through their translucency. Small spotlights act as stepping-stones to the central focus of the gallery: a ring of monitors most viewers will have to look up to see. Covering each monitor is frosted wire-glass that partially obscures the image. Each monitor plays continuous interviews with people from a variety of countries around the world (Represented are: Germany, Italy, Korea, Japan, Brazil, Russia, Ukraine, China, Liberia, Zaire, France, Mexico and Puerto Rico). Each person is trying to explain a difficult, controversial issue of their choice in their own language. Most viewers will not be able to understand due to the language barrier and the fact that the videos are all playing around the viewer at the same time. The use of language as an auditory barrier compliments the visual obstructions. One monitor acts as a surveillance camera and feeds the viewers an image of themselves, also behind wire-glass. Behind the ring of monitors, the gallery’s existing chain link fence protects the gallery from illegal entrance.
The frustration of the visitor in trying to understand the mesmerizing, rhythmic languages is part of the piece. It is evidence of the powerlessness felt due to misunderstandings that occur with or without language difference. It is also evidence of the inherent lovely musicality of language. Barriers has been installed at the Myers School of Art, University of Akron (2002) and the Lynn Mayhew Gallery at Ohio Wesleyan University (1999).
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The frustration of the visitor in trying to understand the mesmerizing, rhythmic languages is part of the piece. It is evidence of the powerlessness felt due to misunderstandings that occur with or without language difference. It is also evidence of the inherent lovely musicality of language. Barriers has been installed at the Myers School of Art, University of Akron (2002) and the Lynn Mayhew Gallery at Ohio Wesleyan University (1999).
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back to home page