Memory Traces

A Holdfast Floating

In A Holdfast Floating, the title connotes both holding on and letting go. The image of figures immersed in water is a metaphor for the unrepresentable — a longing for death as longing for regres¬sion, a return to the womb. One of the larger canvases depicts two figures – one right side up and more developed and the other upside down and painted as a dark silhouette – giving a simultaneous sense of presence and absence. These figures become a motif throughout the series. In the other large canvas an explosive, unformed area suggests the upside down figure. The figure seems to be splitting apart, but is the splitting an act of creation or destruction? In this canvas the shape of the two figures forms a pattern that covers the canvas’ surface. The pattern mimics the look of writing, implying meaning, but that meaning is found only in the code of monotonous repetition. The texts for this painting were created in a kind of collage poetry process. One refers to the origins of language and meaning and the other to myths that direct gender identity.

A Holdfast Floating (Panel #1), oil on canvas, 72” x 26”, 1993

A Holdfast Floating (Panel #2), oil on canvas, 72” x 26”, 1993

A Holdfast Floating (Panel #3), oil on canvas, 72” x 60”, 1993

A Holdfast Floating (Panel #4), oil on canvas, 72” x 26”, 1993

A Holdfast Floating (Panel #5), oil on canvas, 72” x 60”, 1993

Exquisite Corpse

Exquisite Corpse deals poetically with social norms that disempower women. On one side of the gallery three stacks of metal boxes, each containing a sequence of four-color photographs, are arranged in coffin-like footed columns. The photographic images in the central column create a composite image of a woman clothed in white and lying on her back in water. In the other two columns the head of the figure repeats, moving and leaving ghostly traces in the water. Clothing billows out, inflating like wings or a useless life raft. Bits of stories float in and out of the pictures. On the opposite wall are texts, which provide a counterpoint to the hypnotically romantic images. Four scrolls fill the mirrored negative space of the columns. The exact mirror of the columns is blank (silent). Moving from left to right, the text from the first scroll is excerpted from Hélène Cixous, the second from Shakespeare’s Ophelia, the third I wrote, and the fourth is excerpted from Luce Irigaray.

Exquisite Corpse (Detail), 24“x20” type C color photograph from a mixed media installation, 1993

Narcissus

Memory Traces

Memory Traces, takes a poetic look at loss and denial and the creation and dissolution of meaning. It was in large part inspired by the paradox within representation, identified by Julia Kristeva when she wrote, “…loss, bereavement, and absence trigger the work of the imagination and nourish it permanently as much as they threaten it and spoil it…” In the course of developing Memory Traces, I asked myself: What causes meaning to break down and how can one represent this? Literature, history, theoretical writings, fairytales, and mythology provided the raw materials for this work.

— Susan Brenner