Artist Spotlight :: Yumi Kori

It's hard for most of us here at the MF to believe, but we opened Inner and Outer Space one year ago this week. Most of the pieces stayed on exhibit for the published run of the show (04.46.2008 – 01.11.2009), but there were two we decided to extend. Sarah Oppenheimer's 610-3356 remains open indefinitely on the 4th floor of 500 Sampsonia Way and Yumi Kori's kanata will be open through Sunday, May 10th, on the museum's lower level. In honor of its closing next week, here's an Artist Spotlight (including audio) on Yumi Kori.

YUMI KORI
kanata, 2008
water, wood, rubber, light, sound system



kanata
In the deep end of shade
Open the door to light space
The stream of darkness reflects
Glint of the hereafter
Luminescence obliterating memory

“kanata” means “far in the distance” in Japanese. It can imply simply a far off place or the space that exists beyond one’s perception. I hope the viewer will obtain a contemplative state of mind by looking at the light space in the dark water and be able to travel beyond the worldly. --Yumi Kori

Working as an architect and visual artist, Yumi Kori creates spatial installations: worlds to inhabit and experience. Here Kori immerses us in an underground ocean of darkness, causing the viewer to lose some sense of space and time.




The visitor is drawn to the pier—walking out over the water. There is an almost gravitational pull toward the red doorway, a rectangle of hazy light that appears in the darkness. It calls to us—inviting, yet forbidding.




The red rectangular outline frames a textured space behind, offering a tangible reality, and yet some part of it is a reflection. Kori is not just offering an abstract space or form, the red doorway is instead a convergence of reality and illusion. It fluctuates like an optical illusion between depth and flatness depending on where the viewer focuses their attention or depth perception. Visitors feel like they are traveling and yet go nowhere physically, but instead somewhere in the mind, between eye and brain.

The piece encourages us to ask some existential questions: why are we here? This is a space in which to contemplate existence. Kori is interested in creating desire in the audience—the desire to “go”—somewhere—but where? Why do we all have this desire to “go”—where are we going? She is asking us to consider: what is the purpose of this life; where are we all headed on our personal journeys? Is it destiny or Karma that determines the course of our life?




The space is like a hidden lagoon under the movement of every day life above; visitors and staff in the Mattress Factory building. The sound installation—a layering of white noise that Kori composed for the work, creates and accentuates the self-contained nature of the space.

(Taken from Dara Meyers-Kingsley's Curator's Text)

POSTED BY JEFFREY Read All Posts by Jeffrey

Sarah Oppenheimer to Speak at Carnegie Mellon University

THIS JUST IN: Sarah Oppenheimer, whose 610-3356 has been extended and is currently on display here at the Mattress Factory, will be giving a FREE and open-to-the-public lecture at Carnegie Mellon University on Tuesday, February 10th at 5.00PM. All the pertinent details can be found over on the CMU School of Art Website.


SARAH OPPENHEIMER
610-3356 (2008)
aircraft grade plywood, framing structure, view into neighboring yard across street

From the CMU School of Art's Website:

The focus of Sarah’s work is the feedback loop between constructed spaces and pedestrian motion. She studies how the built environment and human behavior reciprocally impact each other; most recently, the way that the visual progression of the human gaze is mapped by the contours of a given space. Sarah opens apertures in existing architectures, modifying the modular units that make up our standardized urban world. These apertures create new lines of sight within the space of display, and can function as both "holes" and "screens."

610-3356 continues to surprise museum visitors and was recently included in critic and blogger Tyler Green's 2008 Top Ten List. Life Without Buildings also posted an insightful review of the piece shortly after it opened here at the MF. I hope to see you at the talk!

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Tyler Green's Top-Ten of 2008

THIS JUST IN: Sarah Oppenheimer's 610-3356 makes Tyler Green's top-ten list for 2008.

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IAOS Review: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Mattress Factory exhibition spreads art through Inner and Outer Space
Thursday, December 18, 2008
By Mary Thomas, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette


David Ellis, shown creating the imagery for one of his trademark "animated motion paintings," is exhibiting in the Mattress Factory's "Inner and Outer Space" and will speak at 7 tonight at the North Side museum.


Individual installations by nine international artists who probe "Inner and Outer Space" add up to one of the Mattress Factory's best exhibitions to date. The North Side venue is no stranger to artists who transgress routine expectations, aesthetic and metaphysical, to create encompassing experiences that position visitors to imagine the world anew.

For this show, says guest curator Dara Meyers-Kingsley, "the 'inner and outer space theme' -- the conceptual underpinning for the exhibition -- not only relates to the form and content of the work but also an approach to artistic practice." The works spill through floors, out windows, into the parking area, onto a Jumbotron and arrive via e-mail. One was completed with the help of local artisans.

Case in point is exhibiting artist David Ellis, who will give an Artist Talk at 7 tonight at the museum ($5, members free). His trademark "animated motion paintings" are captivating, both for their vibrant graphic imagery and their intriguing process.

To create "OKAY," included in the exhibition, he set up a Quonset-hut-like structure in the museum lobby within which he painted from morning until night during his 15-day residency. Ellis paints over previous works, layering imagery that is recorded every few seconds by a camera suspended overhead. He edits these digital images into mesmerizing projected works that change with flipbook speed.

His "FLY" is playing through month's end on the Jumbotron at CAPA, where the New York artist has been conducting workshops this week. In it he does a full-body glide across a floor, wet and illuminated with paint, looking somewhat like he's engulfed in flame. | CONTINUE READING |

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Images from CAPA Workshop - Day 1

Below are some images from last night's educational workshop, which paired students from CAPA High School with Inner and Outer Space artist David Ellis. David continues to work with the students through Wednesday evening and gives a public artist talk on Thursday.

Photos by Justin Merriman of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.









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Tweet Your Questions for Saturday's Curator Talk.

The Curator Talk coming up this Saturday promises to be an engaging discussion about curatorial practice and related thematic threads running through both Inner and Outer Space and the Carnegie International: Life on Mars. It's really great that Douglas Fogle and Heather Pesanti will be able to join Dara Meyers-Kingsley for this special event as we approach the close of both shows. It has been a great year for art here in Pittsburgh, and this event is a great way to cap it off.

A Q&A/discussion session will follow the talk.

For those of you who are unable to attend, or live outside a commutable radius, we are accepting questions in advance via Twitter. I'll do my best to make sure all questions are answered and then post the transcript (organized by Twitter username) here on the MF weblog early next week.

If you'd like to ask Douglas, Dara or Heather a question, send us a message on Twitter (@MattressFactory) before 2.00PM this Saturday. If Twitter's not your thing, you can always send me an email and I'll make sure your question is included with those received on Twitter.

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FLY on Jumbotron in Downtown PGH

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ARTIST TALK: David Ellis

One of my favorite pieces in the Inner and Outer Space show is David Ellis' motion painting, OKAY. I think it really captures the essence of what an artist residency at the Mattress Factory is all about. During the month or so David spent here in Pittsburgh, he assimilated not only into the Mattress Factory community, but the larger Pittsburgh community as well.

For 15 days straight, David created work inside a hanger-like structure he transported from his Brooklyn studio to the museum lobby. More on that process HERE, HERE and finally HERE.

David enjoyed listening to a varied playlist of music while he worked. As museum visitors passed by his workspace, many were drawn toward the bright lights and pulsing tunes. Rather than keeping his MF studio off-limits, David welcomed visitors into his area and invited questions, comments and casual conversation from curious passersby. And when you view the final piece on the museum's first-floor gallery, you can see the many MF staffers, volunteers and helpers that assisted him with the project in quick, still-frame images that flash by in an instant.



The connection between artist and viewer is often times a line drawn in the sand, over which neither dares step. But during his time here at the museum, David erased that line. In my mind, that embodies art-making at the Mattress Factory.

David will be coming back to Pittsburgh the week of December 15 to facilitate a series of workshops with students from Pittsburgh CAPA High School. We will be documenting the workshops with the intent to publish some of the content online. David's week in the STEEL city will culminate with an artist talk at the Mattress Factory on Thursday, December 18 at 7.00PM. More information about the public event HERE.

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Artist & Curator Talks at the MF

12/13 Curator Talk on FACEBOOK
12/18 Artist Talk on FACEBOOK

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Artist Spotlight :: DAVID ELLIS

DAVID ELLIS
OKAY, 2008
HD BluRay DVD TRT: 10 minutes

FLY, 2008
HD BluRay DVD TRT: 6 minutes

OH, 2008
paper, matte medium, oil enamel and latex house paint on wood panel, 34 x 21”

US, 2008
paper, matte medium, oil enamel and latex house paint on wood panel, 55 x 34”

OH, 2008
paper, matte medium, oil enamel and latex house paint on wood panel, 55 x 34”

DROPTET, 2008
4 DVDs TRT: 6 minutes each



David Ellis arrived at the Mattress Factory with a personal archive of collected papers and images and a Quonset-hut like structure in which to paint and be photographed. Essentially transporting the studio inside the Mattress Factory for his residency period, Ellis painted from morning to night inside the curved structure for 15 days in the museum’s lobby. Working in a tunnel of white light with a still camera pointed down from the ceiling, and producing a high-speed camera shoot over one weekend, the cameras captured the artist painting from a bird’s eye view perspective every few seconds. The only record of the continuous layering of paintings that he produced is this volume of digital images, now edited into an animated motion painting entitled OKAY.



DROPTET is a four-part video installation. The title derives from a combination of the word “quartet” and “droplet.” Shot with a high-speed camera at 1000 frames per second, we see paint pouring from the camera in slow motion, bursting onto the floor and coming back at the viewer—a continuous flow. The work becomes a visual quartet. In FLY, to be shown on the CAPA High School electronic billboard in downtown Pittsburgh, the artist catapults into the frame, followed by a flow of paint. Skidding on his back across the wet floor, he leaves the frame, only to then return and elevate out of the visual space.



For the paintings OH and US, the artist paints onto collaged pages comprised of the his to-do list and hardware store needs, papers from the daily grind, as well as things he finds on the street that might spark an idea for new work or trigger a memory. Ellis then responds to the pages by painting in and on them, rhythmically providing a pulse. The painted layer is graphic, loose and flowing. Ellis calls his signature painting form—a graphic wave in silver and black— “flow,” representing motion in air and water. There is an unconscious, visual catalog below the surface of the final work—an archaeological, archival underpinning inside the painting, submerged below grade.



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