Opening Night!

wires and lines - kristin haas

The first time I entered this space, I was intrigued by the mass of exposed cords, cables, wires and pipes. I followed many of these lines with my eye and found that most of the wires and cables were disconnected or unplugged. They were hanging there tangled and abandoned though visually their attractiveness engrossed me.

In response I have created my own lines – out of discarded maintenance materials and paint. The materials used in my installation speak about the space’s history of being transformed into something new so many times over. The work mimics the existing wiring and cords, though without the option for functionality. I have co-opted the form of these functional objects and transformed their purpose into an aesthetic experience.

annushka gisella peck - 'fauxchitecture' statement

“fauxchitecture”
lath, dimensional lumber, nails, steel cable and paint
annushka gisella peck
2008


“Junkspace is additive, layered and lightweight, not articulated in different parts but subdivided, quartered the way a carcass is torn apart - individual chunks severed from a universal condition.”

- Rem Koolhaas

Built space is layered with narratives; vast topographies of individual and collective experience that lie far beyond that which can be visually obtained or reassembled. The contemporary state of historical space - locally and globally – is in a period of rapid change, caught in the entropic catapult of ‘development.’ These changes to surface and structure will reveal, demolish and fragment the associated histories of such spaces. And at the same time, so too will these architectural shells of the once historically relevant and culturally important be quickly re-formatted, re-designed and re-built to suit the needs of contemporary clients and users.

The ease with which “important” space can become subsumed and devoured by its caretaking entity is not without consequence. Such progress often bears as fruit the erasure of traceable lineages, creating histories which are no longer easily recoverable. In addition to this erasure, ‘faux’ histories are also created through the restoration, renovation and cheap period approximation of built and re-built space, each harboring the aim of creating a ‘mood’ above all else. In essence, what ‘fauxchitecture’ repairs, it also destroys. While its surface offers the easy comfort of nostalgia, it exists in reality as a hollow form, nothing more than a transportable membrane, a façade of historical reification which multiplies, fragments and distorts our understanding and access to our personal and collective past, present and future.