8 ways to see, think at Mattress Factory
New media, new technology and new perspectives, both concrete and cerebral, feed eight thought-provoking installations at the Mattress Factory.
The finger of a disembodied hand scrolls down the face of an iPad through a literally and figuratively mindless flow of information.The landscape projected from eight joined, floor-to-ceiling monitors tilts unnervingly, providing viewers a drone’s-eye view. An electronic forest of trackers turns in unison as they follow an object beyond the line of vision. The subtle scent of olive leaves sets up sensory contrast with a field of barbed wire.
They’re part of exhibitions at the museum’s main building and satellite gallery, “Factory Installed @ 1414 Monterey Street,” continuing through Feb. 12, and “Factory Installed @ 500 Sampsonia Way,” through May 28.
All have in common, with one another and with countless others shown over four decades, their installation format and that they were created by artists living in temporary residence.
Otherwise they vary greatly in style and concept, drawing visitors into shifting conversations inspired by our accelerating global linkages.
Dichroic film over the windows gives a fuchsia cast to Pittsburgher Kevin Clancy’s “IRIS_SIRI,” wherein cat figures sit on pedestal-mounted laptop keyboards in front of colorful patterned screens. The aforementioned hand continues to acquiesce to the hypnotic allure of web feed, and U.S. greenbacks tumble in a carnivalesque cube.
The palindrome title “references Iris, the goddess of the rainbow, and Siri, the goddess of the smart phone,” writes the artist, who claims to embrace both utopia and oblivion in the piece. Which visitors embrace is probably dependent upon their definition of progress, but overall, in contemporary America, it seems a combination of cats, computers and cash can’t lose.
Christopher Meerdo of Chicago explores information provided by new technologies and the possible misreading of that information due to a lack of familiarity with its peculiarities, for example, inconsistency in presenting linear time.
His “Active Denial System” was inspired by police body camera pursuit videos. The abstract sculptures began as “blip images, noise frequencies” and the like, reformatted by a three-dimensional modeling technique. The reflective imagery printed on their surfaces, drawn from images of tear gas and flares, sparkles with a luster that belies its dark origins. His HD video, “Metadata,” blends political and personal — in much the way public and private space are conflated in an age of surveillance cameras and cell phones — from drone video to artist-penned poetry.
Duluth, Minn., resident David Bowen’s “SPACEJUNK” is elegant in both idea and design. Fifty mechanized aluminum poles are topped with twigs that point in the direction of orbiting debris from space missions launched as long ago as the 1950s. Part dance, part ritualistic witness, part cautionary reminder of a problem out of sight, the sculptures’ own genetics reminds of the fine-line dynamic of man’s relationship with the natural world.
Palestinian Mohammed Musallam traveled from Gaza to construct “The Great Illusion,” a gallery covered with olive leaves surrounded by a coil of barbed wire upon which Palestinian passports are impaled. Others, formed into paper planes, are snagged overhead. The leaves are symbolic of a time when passports were not needed for travel, says the artist, a proponent of an independent Palestinian state.
Also contributing are Stephan Bram of Australia, Wendy Judge of Ireland, Lauren Kalman of
Detroit and Ezra Masch of Philadelphia.
As the Mattress Factory celebrates its 40th anniversary, these exhibitions are evidence that both the museum and the art genre it champions continue to be relevant, to evolve and to have much to contribute to contemporary dialogue.
The museum parking lot is at 505 Jacksonia St., North Side. Hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, 1-5 p.m. Sunday. Admission: $20; seniors and students, $15; veterans, $10; children under 6 and members, free; half-price Tuesdays and for ZIP codes 15212, 15214, 15233. 412-2313169 or www.mattress.org.