My thesis exhibition entitled The Privilege of Being Solid is an exploration of the tension that is generated by our desire for an ultimate corporeal security and the realization that nothing is permanent. This tension expresses itself in the world in varying degrees through programs of repression oscillating with periods of chaos. <p>We live in a post-modern era of fragmentation and uncertainty, although modernist attitudes concerned with universals, certainties and a manic desire to control largely guide many of our institutions, political and otherwise. I believe that this desire to control creates cultural anxiety due to the virtual unattainability of certainty and control. This denial of our inherent insecurity, vulnerability and ultimate mortality generates a violence that feeds back into our collective anxiety. The loop perpetuates itself in a cycle of fear, denial and arrogance that fuels a raft of industries devoted to security, feeding off of our communal angst. The very human characteristic that has enabled these circumstances is the subject of this exhibition.<p>It is my intention to reflect some of the contradictions found in our current condition by generating a dialogue between fragility and strength; beauty and the abject; certainty and doubt; liquid and solid; as well as humor and emotional gravity. These contradictions extend to my material of choice as well. With the exception of a two channel video installation, all the works in the exhibition employ encaustic (wax) processes. Although wax appears to be solid, it is in fact classified as a liquid. It is always in flux and unless conditions are ideal, wax remains in a precariously unstable condition. It also reflects in its materiality, a sensuality that is of primary importance to me as an artist, both in terms of the processes in which I engage in my studio, as well as the objects I create for a potential viewer.<p>Through sculptural processes of casting, pouring and melting, encaustic mark making and digital manipulations of physical theater, I want to contrast the forces at work within our lives that seek to control our environment with notions of surrender to the natural state of impermanence in which we reside. I want to reflect the oscillation between the collective desire for security and the knowledge of our inherent fragility and vulnerability.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:USASK/oai:usask.ca:etd-06152006-160921 |
| Date | 19 June 2006 |
| Creators | Duncan, Chai Stephen |
| Contributors | Shantz, Susan, Sarty, Gordon E., Purdue, Peter, Fowler, Graham |
| Publisher | University of Saskatchewan |
| Source Sets | University of Saskatchewan Library |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://library.usask.ca/theses/available/etd-06152006-160921/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Saskatchewan or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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