OOO—Flatland
From the artists: OOO has a schedule of one exhibition per calendar year along with its corresponding print catalogue. The next planned exhibition, titled Flatland, is scheduled for early-October 2021, in an outdoor shed in the backyard of a suburban home. Flatland takes Edwin Abbott Abbott’s novella of the same name as inspiration on two points; first, as an investigation of dimension and space, and second, as a critique of normalized cultural hierarchies. Artwork that has been tentatively selected for this exhibition interrogates surface and substrate, and satirizes normalized cultural understandings of labor, class, race, and gender.
The installation of Flatland will take an unconventional approach, utilizing reproduction prints of artwork on non-permanent adhesive vinyl. This exaggerated flattening of artwork shown together with the art-objects themselves playfully questions the aura of authenticity and duplication of labor. As a visual example, in a recent exhibition at the Transformer Station, artist Laura Owens covered a room in vinyl, functioning similar to the famous application of Andy Warhol's cow wallpaper many are familiar with. Our utilization of vinyl will not have the sole boundary of an interior space like these examples, as our reproductions can be tiled, wrapped, warped, and even installed behind or beneath other artworks. Combining the assumed documentation of artworks alongside other works of art creates an installation that conflates representation with presence, authorship and distribution. Art viewing during the past year of COVID has had many people rely on online platforms viewed on electronic screens. A flattened sense of time and space can create an uneasiness or tension between viewer and artwork. With the installation of Flatland, we hope to offer an alternative experience, by combining the flattening and repetition of art images found online within the exhibition space itself. Flatland’s installation will be a hybridization of an online viewing experience with the distribution of art objects in physical space.
OOO takes a collaborative stance with artists when selecting artwork for exhibitions. In July and August we will have virtual studio visits with artists, to discuss their work and to make a selection that would fit with the project proposal. OOO usually has a selection of an artist’s body of work in mind, but occasionally, through the course of our conversations, new ideas for a piece emerge. These collaborative discussions have proved fruitful and fun, and it is always interesting to see each artist’s interpretation of the curatorial statement.