Is the signs of memory trace found within Cornelia Parker’s objects?
Cornelia Parker talks about memories that are found in objects that hold crucial memorable evidence of what life the object has lived through. Parker has acquired a lot of different and forgotten objects from antique stores and from her friends which are cups, pots, pans and even musical instruments.
most of these objects that she acquired were made from silver and other metals because she had a desire to flatten them by using a steam roller or by throwing them off the white cliffs of dover. She done this because whatever memory trace that were held inside of these objects, Parker wanted to resurrect them into a new meaning to create an artwork out of them. It was important for Parker to come by objects that held a memory trace within the tarnished surfaces that would make her work more understandable and meaningful.
Lisa Tickner Interviews Cornelia Parker about ‘Thirty Pieces of Silver’ and she explains about the tarnish traces on the objects;
“Tarnish is one of those things that do not have a value, that people don’t want and find ugly to look at, and so as a material I find it fascinating. It’s somehow like the Turin Shroud: you’ve got this trace, or you’ve taken away this surface, this thing you don’t want, and then you present the tarnish as almost the soul of the object”. (Tickner. 2003. P375)
How Does Cornelia Parker relate to my Vase Readymade objects?
I feel that Cornelia Parker relates very much to my vase Readymades because the vases that I use, hold a record of memories from its previous owners. My Readymade sculpture of vases hold the memory traces of the old couple who originally lived inside the apartment, telling the story of the old couples lives. What was left behind was nothing at all but two vases resembling the old couple that once occupied the apartment and these vases stand in as the remains of the old couple.
Is memory trace found within the surfaces of Rachel Whiteread’s objects?
Rachel Whiteread is a sculpture who uses objects and surfaces that contain an historical past to them. Whiteread used plaster, rubber and resin materials to make her casts from everyday domesticated objects. These objects were bought most of the time just like Cornelia Parker and some of her famously known objects that she casted were her bed mattresses. One of Whiteread’s examples of Mattresses were Shallow Breath (1988) which show early examples of Whiteread’s fascination with indexical traces.
Shallow Breath signifies a momentum in Whiteread’s past where the idea of the death bed was from the documentary that she watched as a child and is combined with her father’s heart condition that makes Shallow Breath the work it is today. These experiences in Whiteread’s past life capture memory traces that she tries to interpret into her own bed works.
How does Rachel Whiteread relate to my vase Readymade objects?
Well.. Rachel Whiteread does relate to my work in a sense that the objects that Whiteread used had been found from all sorts of rundown places and converted these objects into an artwork. The vase objects that I found in this apartment were forgotten and left behind with a memorable record attached to them of the old couple that once occupied the place.
Whiteread’s objects very much tell a similar story to my work where her bed mattresses give the direct traces of the people that have slept on them. The example of her mattress play a similar role with my vase Readymades and give the signs of memory traces that resemble the people that once lived around these objects. The surfaces and the dust trapped inside the vases have been built up over the years which would hold crucial memorable evidence of someone’s pre-existence. These are memory traces.
