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Sondra Arkin

The fundamental qualities of materials attract me in my search for new viewpoints. I work from urban and natural environments, drawing on micro- and macro perspectives, with the goal of translating common landscapes (e.g., sidewalk cracks, river surfaces, dust motes) and juxtaposing textures, while excluding direct or discernable points of identification. As such, my work often strikes viewers as familiar but not precisely definable. My work is spatial, recreating a sense of the familiar through non-recognizable forms. It is about looking so closely that you lose sight of visual reference points.

In the wax paintings, the forms have been described as “suspended.” Through surfaces often as smooth as glass, work that is even only millimeters thick can significantly amplify the illusion of depth. These layers create a tension between where a mark or shape may be, allowing them to float to the fore- and background as the eye moves. These qualities are duplicated in my dimensional wire installations, in which open-weave structures dislocate the viewer’s sense of a firm reference point.

As well, all of my current work is created around a central concept of impermanence: that it can change relative to itself or an environment. For two-dimensional paintings, I designed a flexible mounting system that allows presentation in any orientation. By working in a modular format, frequently with sets that combine into an almost infinitely variable whole (my “Permutations” series), the work resists ossification and invites a viewer to physically alter it (in the link http://www.sondranarkin.com/pti the layout changes every 8 seconds to one of 95 billion+ permutations). My dimensional installations are likewise scalable to show the infinite possibilities of our expanding networks.

Both the nature of my materials and my networked content have led me to more fully consider the role scale plays in my environments. My modular panels can be clustered into large configurations, and installed sets currently include up to twenty panels. Likewise, my sculptural wire units are uniquely organized in every installation with groupings (to date) up to two hundred. The work expands or contracts to fit the environment.

As with most process-based abstractions, my work gains power from being shown in profusion, as a network of objects. Why is this important to me? Because it means there is always a new combination to seek — other solutions, other viewpoints — than the one I might present. It also means that with a grid of as few as nine works, even if one rearranged them every minute of every day throughout a lifetime, one would not repeat the permutations. It suggests that our points of view should be vast and flexible. It means that our ways of observing, for all practical purposes, are infinite.

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