Why look into these artists as part of my work?
Rachel Whiteread and Memory Trace
As part of my ongoing research, I wanted to explore more different artists that play a similar aspect to me in creating art work. The first artist I looked into was Rachel Whiteread who is mostly known for her mammoth size plaster casts such as House and Ghost. The reason why this artist interest me alot with my work is because she makes an artwork from memories and using an old building such as House is a very good example to capturing someone’s pre-existence.
Rachel Whiteread captures an indexical trace of someones life by plastering every room on the inside of the house revealing forensic like traces as a symbol to her work. In her memory capturing way, she uses the traces from someones existence that are traced within a surface and interprets that into her own art work. This is her own way of making her art work from someones elses memories and inspires me to think closely about where my own work is going.
How does Rachel Whiteread Inspire me?
She inspires me in a different form into my work because she uses old buildings and furnitures for her work to express the memories that are carried by them. I express my memories from China with my girlfriend through projection and projecting them moments of time in a dark space which acts as inside my mind.
That darkness in the room is like the loneliness that I suffer when I am without my girlfriend from China and the projections act as a light that brightens my life as well as reliving the moment in time. So in a way Rachel Whiteread inspires me in that memory type way where you show the fragments of past through objects, photos or movies.
Gordon Matta-Clark and Memory Trace of action
I have looked into another artist called Gordon Matta-Clark who is an american sculpture who also uses old buildings to create an artwork. A famously known artwork he create was called Splitting. Matta-Clark would often as not use recordings and photographs to document the moments of dismantling the house. He likes to film and take photos of his process when he is making artwork and these types of medias show a trace of his actions of dismantling the house and generate a memory trace.
Why does Gordon Matta-Clark Inspire me with indexical action?
In a way, Matta-Clark inspires me alot in recording the making of my artwork because it is the fun and interest of creating artwork that I would like to capture on filming. My process is all about capturing that moment in time whether its on filming or on photographs. My process of my working creates that direct imprint of the memory traces in my existence and the discoveries that I have made alongside my processes.
Rosalind Epstein krauss relates photography to memory trace
“On the one hand, the term seems to specify signs on the order of the trace—the footprint, the death mask, the photograph (where the object leaves its imprint on a light-sensitive surface). This type of index partakes of the iconic because the sign resembles the object.” (Krauss. 1977. p203).
