Something spurious and intrusive has taken over the first floor of the Weston Art Gallery, downtown -- a catchpenny house, built by the artist collaborative, SIMPARCH, whose two-person works have been exhibited in the Whitney Biennale and the Tate Modern in London, among many other places. The site-specific sculpture/architecture at the Weston has been made in conjunction with the new architectural structure in the Contemporary Arts Center's lobby across the street, together titled
Gloom and Doom.
SIMPARCH has followed up on a theme popular in contemporary art, beginning perhaps with Vito Acconci's livable (or rather space-enough-for-a-person) art. Yet SIMPARCH's house is not at all a place where you'd like to spend time. It's reminiscent of 1950s pre-fab houses: The main structure is in place, but all the drawers and shelves are empty, seemingly abandoned. Children's drawings, on construction paper, white paper, on the wood with crayons and markers, make merry from the walls of the house's first floor.
But that's expected in a home, I suppose. What isn't expected are the guns pointed at you by regular-looking guys ducked in the corner or stuck to a child's drawing easel. You see the guys and the guns, and your pulse kicks up a notch; you'll be ready to fire back.
Outside the gallery, traffic squeals by. With the sun reflecting on the windshields and cars, light and shadow move ominously across the ceiling. A feeling of impending seizure and doom is certainly the mood SIMPARCH strikes here.
The house has two staircases, which at first I thought allowed some choice for the viewer. Yet, as I went upstairs, closed the door behind me and felt the sudden, thick darkness, I was genuinely afraid. I stepped quickly to the second door, opened it to get some light. A lone bright-blue beach chair lazed in the corner. Scratchy wool walls, dark gray carpet made the dark even darker.
And then booms. Sonic blasts. Echoes. I closed the door again, and, in the darkness, imagined living in a space made entirely of political secrecy, invasions, constraint, silence and suppression.
Take from that what you will. Grade: A-
Gloom and Doom continues through June 25.
