The essays were short, but still interesting and I gleaned a few bits out of them.
[ think of travels in hyperreality! ]
In the Toby Kamps essay, I was reminded that dollhouses, model railroads, and museum displays all fit within this idea of "diorama" and that they can be miniature or life-size and that they are capable of "didacticism" and "free-wheeling fantasy" which I like. "Simulated environments"
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"They engage our sense of depth perception and, with it, a bodily awareness of space, which encourages us to make the imaginative leap into their construct. The static nature of most dioramas also contributes to their uncanny effect. Human vision is keyed to motion , and seeing environments and beings entirely devoid of movement is disconcerting and fascinating--like stop-action photography in three dimensions. Another thrill of dioramas is that they are intrinsically morbid. To arrest life, they must necessarily kill it (literally when taxidermy is involved.)"
Apparently, museum displays of "habitat groups" were developed in Sweden and the U.S. I wonder what the Swedish ones looked like and why those two places?
Donna Haraway wrote an essay called "Teddy Bear Patriarchy: Taxidermy in the Garden of Eden, New York City, 1908-1936"
"In an age where many artists are fluent in several different media, the process of creating discrete universes allows them to bring all their skills to bear. Dioramas allow their makers to be painters, sculptors, landscapers, and architects, as well as scientists and curators. In them, artists can practice painstaking craftsmanship and realism in a time often satisfied with schematic or provisional ideas. " 10!!!! YES!
In the Ralph Rugoff
He brings up some historical examples that I hadn't seen or thought of before, including Ed and Nancy Kienolz (this room that I really like "Sollie 17") . . . I like the room because of its' window and ceiling and completeness and I kind of want to make a room. :)
People whose work I liked in the show:
Michael Ashkin - "tiny no-man's lands" on table tops . . . empty swimming pools, deserts, etc.Matt Collishaw did a miniature English town with a pub and stuff and then projected little videos of a bar fight on them. Kind of neat.
Tony Matelli - did life-size displays like one where three boyscouts are throwing up called "lost and sick" and one where two pre-hominid creatures try to re-attach their tails (that they are loosing through evolution.) I really like this idea because it takes an aspect of science and amplifies it to a really humorous level.
"Tony Matelli specializes in strange "David Lynchean" storytelling, as in his installation Lost & Sick, 1996." (from http://www.artnews.com/issues/article.asp?art_id=1150)
Here is a link to his gallery, Leo Koenig.
Clara Williams built a desktop landscape on a miniature train scale that covers and entire desk in an office cubicle.
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