Carol Emmons and Detail

Carol Emmons's talk was not the most interesting to me, but that may have been in part because I was so exhausted today that I didn't have the best creative energy to receive it. I wasn't particularly excited about her list of themes and the structure of her presentation, but I did really enjoy her work. 

I am personally really curious about and interested in installation work, and I was excited about that talk because I had never heard directly from an installation artist before. The thing that stuck out most to me about her work was her insane and impressive attention to detail. She truly considered and thought out every single aspect of the rooms she was making art in. I like that she responded to and built from the spaces themselves instead of starting with an external idea and trying to cram it into the confines of the space. 

Sorry the pic quality is so bad,
I screenshotted these from her website. 

I found this particularly striking with her Surveying Desire XIII: Observatory piece. She explained the details from the design on the platform to the words on the windows to the curtains with tons of little quotes on them and the little people figurines on the big circles of text on the ten walls. My previous exposure to installation art has been primarily installations that have really overwhelming or visually extroverted compositions, but hers are a little more subtle, while still retaining incredible complexity. I really appreciated how she pointed out those details to us too. 

I wonder what the experience would have been like to go there in person and see if I would notice all of those little details if I hadn't had them explained to me first. I feel like that could've been very fun and playful to explore and make those discoveries on my own, but I also feel sure that I would've missed much of that complexity without her explanation. I also loved how she talked about the experience of the person who sits on the stool and is watched by everyone else. I can imagine feelings of discomfort and embarrassment on both ends of that, both being watched and watching someone else look at things, which would've made for a very interesting experience. 

I think if I were to make my own installation piece I would draw from Emmons and pay attention to how the specific details and shapes of the room can add to my piece and change its meaning. I probably would not put as much small detail though, that would drive me crazy!