Artist Talk - Sammy Persons: Commodity, Commotion, Communication

Commodity, Commotion, Communication, an installation of new work by Kansas City based artist and Urban Culture Project Studio Resident Samantha Sammy Persons, opened at Charlotte Street Foundation's Urban Culture Project Space, in Kansas City, MO, in conjunction with a Third Friday reception on January 15, 2010.

A manipulator of signs more than a producer of art objects, Persons constructs paintings and interactive sculptural environments from materials drawn from her own lifetime and which signal the difference between Art and non- art identified objects—her materials palette includes house paint, vinyl letters, art books and catalogs, bendy straws, , air fresheners, life-sized Hanna Montana Stickers, highlighters, and glitter, among much else. In part, Persons calculated barrage of fragments and collaged images signifies the saturation of text/media in contemporary culture. At the same time, this field of partial and re-contextualized information is meant to position the viewer as an active reader of messages rather than passive contemplator of the aesthetic or consumer of the spectacular. Further, by appropriating traditionally gendered materials, such as 2 by 4s, which she paints bright pink, as well as by building up the surfaces of painting with stickers, which have a long historical correlation to femininity and decoration, the artist seeks to heighten tension between masculine support and feminine façade, destabilizing our standard readings of familiar products and materials.

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

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• art
• studio
• artists
• Sammy
• Persons
• Samantha
• Urban
• Culture
• Project
• Charlotte
• Street
• Foundati