Katchadourian is an interdisciplinary artist dealing mostly with conceptual and many times humorous subject matter. Her work involves collaborations with nature, exploitations of misunderstandings, organization and appreciation of the disarray that comes from perceived failures in her work. Katchadourian was articulate and personable, slightly resembling Rachel Griffiths, both in looks and mannerisms, and I overheard the terms "cute" and "adorable" more than several times from the people around me.
Some of my favorite pieces of hers included her Mended Spiderwebs, Renovated Mushroom, Artificial Insemination, Animal Crossdressing, and CARPARK, where she organized cars at a college campus by color.
If you live where I live, you may have seen some of her work recently at Mass MoCA (Falls Colors) or a few years ago at the Tang at Skidmore, such as Accent Elimination and Talking Popcorn.
In Talking Popcorn, Katchadourian translated Popcorn popping noises using Morse Code and a computer program. A carnival style popcorn machine with a microphone inside is hard to miss in a gallery. She even had bronzed a few kernels "Talking Popcorn's First Words". You may be saddened to know that Katchadourian received a phone call from a gallery curator, letter her know that Talking Popcorn had, in effect, committed suicide. Luckily (perhaps in a silver lining sense) for Katchadourian, the computer housed within the base of the popcorn machine was not badly damaged by the flame, and she was able to have Talking Popcorn's Last Words.
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1 comment:
When I was in San Diego, I saw her video "Accent Elimination," freaking brilliant!
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