Of Art and Fish

Of Art and Fish

A few notes about the SEED folks, local art culture and a handsome plate of salmon.

by Will Taylor

A couple of weeks ago, a friend and I stopped by the SEED art show. Just so you know, SEED is not an acronym for anything. It’s just the name. However, the show may have stood for something more telling. Aside from the artistic themes represented, shows like this are a way to check the pulse of Chattanooga’s small, yet scattered art crowd. Does Chattanooga have what it takes to support a meaningful art scene?

The week before, Mark Parton threw his now annual Uncanny Inspirado bash for a stellar crowd. But, it met a bit of unexpected resistance from a small, highly vocal minority of moral watchdogs. Now, it was SEED’s turn. And, once again, people came out in force. This time, resistance was minimal. Maybe the address kept the naysayers at a distance.

The space the SEED group rents with their small grant is near the projects off of 4th Avenue, in what’s called the Rivoli Art Center. The name is rather grandiose for what is essentially a musty, old textile mill that’s been gutted and converted into two floors of studios and workshops. But, from what I hear, the rent is cheap and the landlords are cool.

Toward the back of the building, there’s about 1,800 sq. ft. of space set aside for shows like this one. Though it’s a relatively small area, the SEEDies have managed to draw a significant crowd. After talking with a few of the Uncanny Evolution Gallery folks who are mingling at the show, I wander off to take a look at the art on display.

The standouts are easy to spot. Fortunately, among them are the works of Westbrook and Trowbridge. I’m not sure what I would have written if their work had sucked. They’re both very nice people and I’d hate to bag on them. I was seriously relieved to see that wouldn’t be an issue.

Westbrook’s series of 8x10 photographs (entitled Nature Scenes) is mounted, without frames, in a grid pattern on the wall. They exude the simple candor and clarity of common images, tinged with a bit of melancholy. One image is that of her young son lying in a manicured, green field with giant, metal high-tension towers in the background. Another captures the final moments of an orange Popsicle melting in the middle of the street. Her photography is subtly engaging and real, giving viewers a sense that they’re sharing the space with the subjects in the pictures.

Westbrook says she was happy with the turn out. But being so close to the show, it was hard to get an objective view.

“I was totally high on adrenaline,” she says. “Meeting and greeting so many people, I sort of missed the first hand experience of being part of the crowd.”

Though Westbrook says the show took a lot of energy to put together, she likes being able to show her new work in their new studio space. But describing her work seems like something she’d rather leave to others.

“It's all still really new,” she says, grimacing as she searches for way to encapsulate her creative process into a sound bite. “My initial intention was to give myself a project where I could just go out and take pictures of landscapes.”

As the project developed, she says that it started to evolve into something different. The “nature” images she was getting all tended to reveal elements of an intruding suburban infrastructure, or as she says, “Things that connect interior space to exterior space – like utilities, sewage, electricity. Things that go in and out of the house.”

“I realized that (the concept of) a natural world was just sort of a romantic idea,” Westbrook continues. “So, then I just went ahead and photographed the things I see all the time.”

Even though Westbrook’s images are almost tranquil, it’s hard not to see a bit of social commentary laced throughout the series.

“I kind of try to duck from contemporary issues, politics, culture,” she says, sounding unconvinced by her own statement. Then she admits, “But my suspicion is always that the worst case scenario is probably what’s really happening.”

Trowbridge has what appears to be a couple of installations on display (I later learn that it’s one piece, with various components). For one of the pieces/components, he’s laid a TV monitor flat on its back, and mounted it underneath a bowl-shaped canopy of Astroturf – from a distance it looks a bit like he’s stolen a putting green from a miniature golf course and draped it over a small audio-visual cart. Upon closer inspection, there’s a plastic window sewn into the middle of the faux-lawn area that allows people to look down at the image on the monitor below. On top of that, he’s poured about an inch of water. It puddles in the center, directly over the window. The TV glows up from the bottom, through the window, playing a green-tinted video loop of distorted, pixilated, amoeba-like images dancing and squirming around.

The effect is that of peering into a luminescent swamp or a radioactive sinkhole. The piece is instantly intriguing. But, buyers beware… I really doubt this combination of water and electronics has the Good Housekeeping seal of approval.

Trowbridge calls the piece Time Quake / I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon, explaining that the story behind the work is rooted in his early adolescence.

“It was a culmination of a period in my life where I moved to Memphis, TN and was dropped into kind of a hellacious grade school there,” says Trowbridge. “It was really a rough period. But on a larger thematic scale, it was about being stuck in memory.”

There’s a current of nervous enthusiasm in Trowbridge’s voice as he continues.

“Time Quake is from a Kurt Vonnegut novel where everybody has to relive an entire year of their life knowing what’s going to happen next,” he explains. “I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon is a short story by Philip K. Dick. It’s about a computer that plays a guy’s memories for him while he’s on a journey. The computer is trying to keep him entertained. But it keeps locking on to a few, single, negative things. The whole story is about how things that happen to you get replayed again and again and again, endlessly.”

Trowbridge says this showing encourages him. While worried about finding a way to fund additional art projects here in town, he’s says the lead SEEDs are moving forward on their next big project.

“Our next project is going to be at the Hunter Museum,” Trowbridge says. The October 20th show will be entitled Polymer and will be curated by Trowbridge and Westbrook. “It’s an exhibit of contemporary video art and experimental video.” (Click here for show details.)

Wandering, once again… I leave the crowd that’s gathered around Trowbridge’s tribute to OSHA violations to check out some other interesting pieces. There’s a pair of stereoscope viewing-goggles mounted in front of a TV. There’s some blue-faced doll heads mounted on one wall. There’s a log that’s been cut into long strips, then reassembled back into log form. I’m too stupid to understand this one. Or maybe I haven’t done enough meth to appreciate what must have been a long, painstaking process. But it looks cool enough. The biggest piece of the night is a gigantic homemade, non-species-specific, plush toy (possibly a panda) sitting in the middle of a 500 sq. ft. bamboo forest. I’m not sure why, but I like it. Unfortunately, it’s just a tad too big for my living room. Then again, it could be my living room.

“If I could convince the artist to add a couch and a 32-inch flatscreen to this piece, I’d buy it for sure,” I say to my friend.

She laughs even though it’s not that funny – the sign of a true friend. Next to us, a total stranger says to me, “Not bad for Chattanooga.” His meaning is ambiguous. And he walks off before it occurs to me to ask for clarification. It reminds me of this classic Saturday Night Live skit where an inexperienced crew of knuckleheads is left in charge of nuclear reactor with only the following instruction: “You can never have too much water in the core of the reactor.”

So, “Not bad for Chattanooga?” Is that a message of hope or acceptance of hopelessness?

Later that night, my friend and I are at the Hair O’ the Dog pub on Market and 4th Street, and we’re still talking about the show. By the way, you’d never guess that 4 months ago the place was a defunct coffee joint. It looks like it’s been there for ages.

The topic comes back to: Does Chattanooga have what it takes to support a meaningful art scene? My friend says she’s heard people talk about Chattanooga’s “master plan” for becoming the next Austin, TX. (Is this true? If readers know anything about this, send me an email at willtaylor@fortifiedcreative.com.)

I reply, saying some of the following, but not necessarily in this order and not nearly as economically: “A master plan for supporting the arts? Wow. That would involve a massive rethinking of views on art and art culture. And in a way, it almost seems like the issue is less about the art and more about the culture. The conservative business set would have to understand that artists, while wacky, are an important part of developing a thriving, progressive community. Somehow the crowd that thinks Tommy Bahama is edgy would have to accept the crowd that thinks Edward Kienholz is edgy – and the Kienholz lovers would have to embrace the non-funded, self-schooled outsider crowd – and the lion will lie down with the lamb - and so on and so forth. All that goodwill and open-mindedness among such fragmented demographics? It seems unlikely when even cities like Santa Monica, CA have had trouble finding such a balance.”

Keep in mind, we’re both relative newcomers to the area. So, what do we know? But my friend is dead set on being optimistic and convinces me to think likewise. We’re served our matching Grilled Salmon Plates (with steamed broccoli and baked potatoes as our chosen sides) and I feel even better. It’s a big portion of meat and damn tasty. No arguments here… For $8.95, that’s art, my friends.

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ABOUT THE REPORTER:
Will Taylor is a writer and advertising consultant who recently moved to Chattanooga from Los Angeles. He’s written for numerous arts and entertainment publications in California and, on the advertising side, has worked with companies such as Universal Music Group, Siemens Transportation, Ebay, The Sacramento Kings and McClatchy News Services. For more information, visit his website at fortifiedcreative.com

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