At once infinite and ephemeral, Golden’s immersive structures have been described as psychological architecture for the way they thoughtfully embed layers of consciousness within socio-economic stratification. Upstairs at Steve’s depicts a complete upending of an outdoor tableau, set in a seaside landscape. The exhibition reveals a mysterious confluence of biography, history, psychology, and nature. Familiar household objects are strewn across the dunes, as if deposited from a natural disaster, with an accompanying soundscape adding another atmospheric layer.
To achieve the dueling sensations of depth and expanse, the artist distorts perspective with strategically placed mirrors, prompting viewers to question what is real and what is illusion. Golden has introduced a new dimension to her signature practice of warping space—notably employed in her installation, The Meat Grinder’s Iron Clothes, at the 2017 Whitney Biennial—as she looks to the outdoors. Building upon the artist’s original soundscape, visitors are invited to submit audio recordings of their immediate surroundings (recordings can be e-mailed to info@fabricworkshopandmuseum.org), with the goal of generating a cumulative and collaborative soundscape over the course of the exhibition.
Call for Participation: A Day Ends / A Day Begins
During the sunset hour, light falls through the channel of mirrors in Samara Golden’s installation, creating the soft spectacle of a day closing. A defining characteristic of this current moment is an overwhelming feeling of isolation coupled with a pervasive, wired connectivity. We began to wonder in this unsteady time, how do we reflect on our days? How can we understand this moment with empathy? Can technology help us?
With these questions, we reached out to Chris Callison-Burch of University of Pennsylvania’s Computer and Information Science Department which led to a partnership with PhD student Ajay Patel. Ajay created an interface for FWM which can collect visitor reflections and use these reflections to potentially expand the ability of technology and artificial intelligence to generate empathy and reflect and refract a collective response.
Visit aday.fabricworkshopandmuseum.org to participate in the project; please note that A.I. responses may take some time to generate after you submit your reflections. Thank you for your patience as the A.I. program is learning!
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Video: FWM Studio on collaborating with Artist-in-Residence Samara Golden