Added Dec 13, 2005
Hemstitch and the Mandrel is a C. Farrell Scholarship project that investigates consumer desire through the creation of five monumentally sized paintings of retail shop windows, painted life-size and installed in an art gallery. After measuring and photographing approximately 30 shop windows around the Seattle, Bellevue, and Portland shopping centers, I choose five images with the strongest compositions from which to work.
By painting the images life-sized, I simulate what the average viewer may see while browsing shop windows on the street or in the shopping mall. However, my images exist in a gallery setting, where they do not have to compete for attention, and can be given a closer consideration. This method of display brings a critical view to the elements that create the narrative of desire for the objects or ideas displayed for consumption within the given space. .
For me, the most interesting part of this project is questioning how visual consumer culture seduces us. In Hemstitch and the Mandrel, I am attempting to expose the hegemony manufactured by capitalist marketing. At the same time, I am interested in using the (seemingly archaic) medium of paint to justify to myself the relevancy of painting as a contemporary artistic medium.