Jo Michelle
Piper

Artistic Practice In Summary: • August 2018: I completed a Masters of Fine Art.• As part of my research, I participated in a self-directed residency in the remote north-west corner of Iceland during winter. • I spent a month alone to consider the concept of light in dark and air as breath; a walking meditation on solitude, space and silence in an arctic desert landscape.Conceptual Interests:• I am interested in the synergy that intimately connects our internal human biology with the external landscape.• I am curious about my perception of skin as a border containing the self.• I question whether a shift in this perception could collapse imaginary boundaries between each other and between the human and non-human world in which we are entwined.• The complexity of constructed networks and intricately entangled detachment fostered by immersion in technology, has opened both an opportunity and a need to re-evaluate the human and nonhuman relationship.• I started walking this path to consider air… to investigate one of the most intimate and yet complex networks we share. • I am curious whether a considered appreciation of the airy network that surrounds and inhabits us holds the potential to demystify the alluring power and complexity of all other systems in which we are entangled.• Over the past 2 years, I have been working on a series of light drawings which were developed during my research for the MFA.• I draw by piercing translucent paper to allow the light in.• By creating the light drawings, I simultaneously draw with air.• Most drawings focus on the relationship between the surface and the drawn mark. With this style of drawing, the reality of the world sits within the picture plane - light as reality, the world behind the paper drawn into the surface.• The slow, repetitive nature of the process became very meditative, and as a result, the influence of breath slowly crept into the project. • What started to change with the development of the light drawings was the intention of breath. Each hole became a single breath...inspiration with intention...followed by a relaxed and natural exhale… as I pierce the translucent paper that was stretched and taught like skin. • Breath is at the very heart of connection (and destruction).About the Artist• I am a visual storyteller with a fascination for breath as air caught in the global calligraphy of wind and light. • I am a walking body of symbiotic evolution, and breath…the embodiment of 200,000 years of homo sapien history and breathing and wandering.About the Art:• The light drawings are on long rolls (approx. 2.5m) of Japanese Shoji paper that create a translucent quality when suspended in light. Stretched and taught they appear like skin, suspended as an architectural element in space. • A series of drawing suspended in this way would create an area in which the shadows and movement of the viewer are present.• The audience becomes part of the work, the connected web, an influential part of the environment rather than a passive viewer of the outcome.• I am interested in our connection to each other and to the “whole” (web) in which we participate. • The human experience.• Caught between land and sky. • A slither of light and breath… and then exhale.• As an additional possibility to the installation: I propose a live drawing performance within the space - a threaded network of slow, considered movement and breath. • Drawing a line that flows & follows a repetitive motion; slowly covering a large circle of white light placed on the floor in the centre of the installation. • Drawing with dark indigo pigment, glimpses of white light will remain, like a path that traverses frozen landscapes. • An abstract landscape of drawn line over light created while slowly walking. • Drawing as a reflection of the air that etches, erodes, marks and draws onto every surface it encounters.• Indigo because of the intense indigo light that filled the Arctic sky before 18 hours of darkness.• A simple circle of light in the centre of the installation and four fans facing out toward the audience. A sense of calm in the centre and windy turbulence outside. • Once the drawing is complete, four people will simultaneously turn the fans inwards, creating a dust storm of pigment and light.• Two approaches to drawing: one, that uses light and air and shadow as the medium (the light drawings); the other (the performance) slowly covers the last glimpse of light until only a fine thread of light remains within the textured indigo landscape. • Time spent alone in the Arctic winter created an appreciation for light and dark, the nuances of black and the subtle textures held within a vast white desert landscape.