It’s Like This Every Day
Nine Gallery, Portland, Oregon, 2011
Thirty-One Days, 2011
Wood, acrylic paint, paper, glue
72 x 84 x 1.25 inches
Every day for one month in 2010 I took photographs of colors whenever I saw one that struck me. I recorded when and where I saw each color, what the object was, and what I was doing when I saw it. Thirty-One Days is a translation of that record. Thirty-one panels are laid out as a calendar; each panel represents one day, and each stripe is one of the colors that I saw on that day. Written on each color is its history of time and place - an attempt to capture a moment and make it tangible.
Going Around, 2011
Wood, acrylic paint, paper, glue
72 x 84 x 1.25 inches
Going Around is made up of thirty-one panels as well. The colors come from Thirty-One Days, one color from each day. The lines represent paths that I walk or drive as part of my regular routine: on the way to school, the doctor’s office, the video store, etc. I traced each path from a map of Portland, folded my tracing (drawing a reflection of the original path) and created the symmetrical forms. The lines flow into themselves. Everyday routine can be that way; sometimes you are back and forth so often that it feels like you are going around in circles.
While Thirty One Days is a direct document of time and experience, Going Around tries to make sense of both. The first piece shows a linear movement, proceeding from one minute to the next, where the elements are empirical. The second piece follows a circular pattern, layering and weaving color and line, the way our memory rearranges images and thoughts from our past.
Photos: Maria T.D. Inocencio
