In the space of just a few words, Christopher Maddox can envision an entire universe.
Maddox, an artist-in-residence at Central Michigan University, has created a lush and challenging multimedia work “≠” on display until Dec. 30 at Arts + Literature Laboratory.
The installation uses separate translations of Jorge Luis Borges’ The Garden of Forking Paths to explore parallel realities and human imagination.
“[Borges’ book] suggests to me that dreams are constructed from the vapors of roads not taken,” says Maddox.
At the gallery’s entrance, a handmade book contains line-by-line comparisons of two English translations of Borges’ work — one from Borges’ artistic partner Norman Thomas di Giovanni, and the other by Andrew Huxley. Colored lines diverge from certain phrases and connect others to underscore places of variance.
This serves as an informative jumping-off point for an array of multimedia pieces that span the full gallery space, creating an immersive experience for viewers. Splintered projections displayed on the gallery wall, depicting antiquated family photos, are cut up and displayed with sections of collage. The projections rotate at regular intervals, allowing visitors to project their own backstories and narratives. On a single page, pinned to a white shelf, Maddox has created a document deconstructing the discrepancies between texts with the length and precision of a scientific study. In it, the artist notes the use of the word “Noose” in one version of the text, where “Rope” is used in the other, a charged disparity that quietly demonstrates how the variance in a single word can create two wholly different interpretations of a text.
Also on display until Dec. 30 in ALL’s split gallery space is the joint work of University of Wisconsin arts professors Derrick Buish and Dale Kaminski. Buish Kaminski Collaborations features a series of a large-scale prints created by Kaminski, each later accented by Buish with a series of stark hand-painted symbols.
The background prints in the exhibit, created by Kaminski, are themselves relatively simple: Some depict landscapes such as a horizontally tilted shoreline, or the almost-invisible traces of power lines against a blue sky. Others are formal abstractions and grainy color fields — and all bear the subtle hint of digital manipulation.
Buish’s additions, superimposed over each print, are stark and symbolic — strange, rounded alien forms with sharp, repeating patterns. This quiet mystery, and the base simplicity of both printed and painted elements, force a viewer to engage with the pieces more carefully.
In one piece, depicting a blue, painted cartoonish tower, the print underneath is dominated by blurred sections of blue and white color planes. The silhouettes of an insect and a bird in mid-flight are both visible. It’s only after looking — really looking — that you’ll notice the insect’s shape is an actual photograph, while the bird’s is a graphic construction. The collaborative works lead to these types of discoveries for the patient and curious viewer.
