Statement of Intent:
Blanket facilitates a phenomenological experience of the conceptual underpinnings of spectacle and surveillance; the denial of possibility for optical surveillance operates simultaneously with an increased intimacy between both spectators and art. This spectacularized interference provides an experiential understanding of the internal contradictions within the contemporary secured society: hidden observation and oppression function behind spectacularized barriers (policing and security).
The theatricality and inherent artificiality of an invading fog reflect the false construction of both the art gallery as a neutral space, but also perhaps more significantly, the spectacular sanitation of Vancouver’s ever-expanding built environment, an on-going smoke-and-mirrors performance that foreshadows the impending Olympics. Surveillance is an extreme misuse and oppression of the senses. It is not only a privacy issue, but one involving the inequality of power.
Through the fog comes a heightened sensory experience. We are interested in transforming the gallery into an environment that will take on a felt sense of the uncanny, at once eerie but also comforting. All things will be equalized in a sudden new blindness. As sight is limited, an everyday relationship with space is disturbed, but at the same time, a paradoxical collective experience of interactivity and personal privacy is attained.
Artist Bio:
We work collaboratively on socially conscious, politically engaged artworks. We view art as a medium to facilitate phenomenological public acts, whereby participants experience transformative potential.