Back to Back

selected works from 1985-2009

Sometimes I like a happy ending; sometimes I like a sad ending (2009)
random objects random thoughts (2009)
Signs of Life: an intimate portrait of someone I don't know (2008)
Le stade du Miroir (2003)
you are on my mind (2003)
The Trouble with Translation (2003)
Family Album (2002)
between two points (2001)
Doing Time (2000)
Staging Memory (2000)
I should have, I could have, I would have... ...if only (1998)
I am ... (1998)
The Veiled Room (1998)
Projections for the Unseeing (1997)
A Portable Viewing Station for Anxious Travelers (1994)
In Memoriam Forgetting and Remembering Fragments of History (1993)
Measure of the Man (1992)
Fragments for a Story (1991)
Search for Definition (1991)
Isn't your/my mother beautiful? (1990)
Neon for j.e. atkinson (1990)
My lips are sealed (1989)
Contradictions and Possibilities (1988)
In the room (1987)
Hide and Seek (1985)
Back to Back (1985)

Back to Back, 1985

Materials: Hydrocal , burlap, silicone [30 wall mounted body fragments; 20 freestanding figures]
Dimensions: Body fragments: each 44 x 24 x 6 in.; figures: each 57 x 32 x 7 in.
Site: Toronto Sculpture Garden, Toronto.
Photo credit: Bill Greer.

Back to Back explores the boundaries between public/private and inside/outside, shifting always between the two positions. The installation suggests a tension between presence and absence and questions the relationship between our psychological state and our physical body. The figures are shells, cast from moulds made directly from the naked backs of my husband and I. The mould making and casting process is repetitive, but produces figures that are unique. All the figures are headless and hollow. The expressive gestures of the body shells suggest the presence of the absent physical heads and offer the viewer the imaginative projective placement of their own head. The hollow shells contain the imprint of the absent body. The placement of the figures and the imprint of an absent body suggest an event that has happened or is about to happen; a suspended and elusive moment.