JOSEPH LITZENBERGER
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
In general, these ten pieces are composed of either found household materials, like couch stuffing and crayons, or more institutional materials, like chrome-plated steel. Because these pieces are straightforwardly constructed and use a limited number of contrasting elements, placement of the component parts becomes a crucial formal and conceptual issue. This is perhaps most evident in Chatter, a group of six small chrome chair shapes arranged in a circle around a central chair, also of chrome. These knee-high forms look precariously balanced and incomplete. Horizontal and vertical sections are arbitrarily joined at their ends to form a series of 90 degree angles. Each chair is missing at least one arm, leg, or back support, creating a sense of disequilibrium and making them dysfunctional as furniture. Chatter also offers a textbook example of how parallax functions in visual perception. As you walk around the circle of chairs, you notice how the overall geometric pattern of their lines changes as you move. In addition, the shiny chrome segments reflect fragments of the surface of the gray-painted wooden gallery floor. The shadowed lines of the crevices between the planks create subtle striped reflections on the chrome bars, and these also change as you move.
Chatter invites all sorts of emotional dialogue as well as different visual perceptions. The chairs’ small size jogs childhood memories of school and games, while the sophistication of the chrome steel suggests an office environment. Even before looking at the title sheet, I’d been reminded of a time in kindergarten when I’d been sitting at a table with a number of classmates. A couple of us were whispering, so the teacher had tied a cloth band over our mouths to keep us quiet. And, of course, we cried. Poignantly, Chatter comments on the uncertainty we experience in both childhood and adulthood.
