Outside In

works by Shawn Pelech 

 November 28 - December 24 | Reception / Meet the artist: Friday, December 1 / 5-8pm

The odd objects in the window, a stop light, a carved whale, a Virgin Mary, a tile cutter, a doll house, a pot belly stove. There they stand for all to see as a moment in time. I was drawn in, to look again and again. Each room combined, forming a still life of disparate objects someone had kept.

When teaching, I would spend whole days setting up these disparate objects but didn’t realize til now the importance and impermanence of it all.

A definition from the Tate Modern:
Still life includes all kinds of man-made or natural objects, cut flowers, fruit, vegetables, fish, game, wine and so on. Still life can be a celebration of material pleasures such as food and wine, or often a warning of the ephemerality of these pleasures and of the brevity of human life.

A memento is an artwork designed to remind the viewer of their mortality and the shortness and fragility of human life. Ephemerality is the concept of things being transitory, existing only briefly. It is used to describe objects and nature intended to last a short time in order to increase their perceived aesthetic value. This concept is a relative one. Andy Goldworthy is a great example of this, as is sand sculpture on the beach.

So this in itself is an art work. The owner spent time in Maine and on the West Coast. I was hoping to meet him, but the universe had other plans. In November, unknown to me, he had to leave his memento behind. I have recordrf it with love through painting.