Collective Consumption

Video of Jenifer Wightman installing “Ephemeral Artist,” for the group exhibition Collective Consumption. Co-curated by Claire Sexton & Christina Vassallo for the Dumbo Arts Festival 2010.

OPENS THIS FRIDAY!!! 9/24, 6 pm - 9 pm

Artworks in “Collective Consumption,” by Do:Tank Brooklyn & Shelton Davis, William Downs, Michelle Vitale Loughlin & Matt Pass, and Ryan Roa.

Members of Do:Tank Brooklyn and co-curator Christina Vassallo test the palette chair lounge

Interference 2.0 - Michelle Loughlin

As the profile of the  www.ifitwasmyhome.com map evolves, I continue to document the current shape and translate the spill’s physical qualities into three dimensional forms. For Collective Consumption, I adopt a more personal narrative asking what “if it were my home” in Jersey City, New Jersey?  My own home is situated between the entrances of both the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels. I have collected car parts discarded along major highways leading into both the tunnels. By collecting these abandoned car parts and recreating the current profile, I am reinterpreting the oil spill on a micro level while illustrating the impact that car use has my own community. Using fiber allows me to articulate the colors, forms  and physical process created when oil and water mix. Interference is technical term used to describe the process of when oil and water mix and also serves a double meaning for the impact car use has on our own communities daily .

Fun Facts:
Lincoln Tunnel carries almost 120,000 vehicles per day, making it one of the busiest vehicular tunnels in the world. The XBL is by far the busiest and most productive bus lane in the United States.^[8] The lane operates weekday mornings between 6:15 and 10:00 a.m., accommodating approximately 1,700 buses and 62,000 commuters, mainly to the Port Authority Bus Terminal. The high ridership on the XBL is higher than New Jersey Transit’s commuter rail into Penn Station.^[9]

Holland Tunnel was used by 34,698,000 vehicles in 2007,^[5] according to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey — the bi-state government agency that owns and operates the Holland Tunnel and several other area bridges, tunnels, and airports. That is slightly less than the 34,729,385 vehicles seen in 2006, but up from the 33,964,000 vehicles in 2005.

Short video of Michelle Vitale Loughlin working on her installation, “Interference 2.0”

William Downs installs what will become a wall of drawings.

“Gravity Does Not Grant Me the Privilege of Failure” from 2008 will be in view in Collective Consumption, adopted by Christina from the Fine Art Adoption Network, also a part of the show.

Coco Papy was born in Savannah, Georgia into a southern mix of Greek, Minorcan (other fun stuff too) family. She currently lives and works in Brooklyn, NY and works as a photo re-toucher in her other life where she began her interest in her work, after staring at images of women for hours, trying to airbrush the imperfections out of them.

One half of the Jersey City-based Agitator’s Collective, who has something up his sleeve for Dumbo.

Hay Guise!

I’m curating this art show with my friend Christina (@randomnumbernu, http://randomnumber.nu/) for the Dumbo Arts Festival at the end of this month. It’s gonna be super cool, but woefully short, so I hope you can come on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday the 24th, 25th, or 26th and check it out!

Opening reception on Friday from 6-9 with a live sound performance by Matt Pass (in conjunction with Michelle Loughlin’s installation piece) and there are workshops on Saturday and Sunday at 3 pm with John Baca, Douglas Paulson, and Christopher Robbins. You can be part of the New Claes Oldenball!

The Tumblr will have announcements and fun facts about the artists and artworks, please do follow and spread the word! So far we’ve got just a few posts but there will be a lot coming up - we’re starting installation tomorrow.

Michelle Loughlin, Interference

Enraged by the BP Oil Spill and inspired by the visualization map: www.ifitweremyhome.com, I began to investigate grassroots community cleanup efforts and the spill’s physical qualities to create Interference for Lion Brand Yarn Studio’s exhibition on view until November, 2010.

Lion Brand Studio: Interference, detail, (fiber, pantyhose stuffed with human hair, and wire, 5ft x 7ft).

Interference is a term used to describe the colors created when oil and water mix. Inspired by the BP oil spill clean-up efforts in the Gulf of Mexico, Interference is composed of colorful fibrous machine-knitted forms stitched and woven together to reflect recent photo documentation of the spill.  First drawing and then knitting water-like forms, I reference both the mixing of oil and water as well as oil- netted shapes that are now seen floating throughout the coastal region. Part of what interested me in the spill documentation  is the incredible array of colors that are present in the spill; from the blues, reds, and oranges to the golden sheens. Through fibers, I am capable of blending these oil structures on a macro scale, while maintaining a sense of autonomy on the micro scale where individual stitches, colors, and patterns are easily recognizable.  In addition, pantyhose stuffed with hair were hand-stitched into the piece in a technique adopted from grassroots community clean up efforts.  The shape of Interference was derived from the original map on the web site: www.ifitwasmyhome.com. The profile of the oil spill is continuously changing and I am interested in  documenting the movement of the spill further.