mother_daughter_mother
online exhibition

Jenny Arntzen, artist

artist statement

There are affordances and opportunities unique to digital technology. This work is an example of exhibition that only exists because digital technology makes it possible to create animation loops that place the images in endless juxtaposition to each other.

This work is comprised of thirty-six drawings, animation software, web authoring software and word processing software. The thirty-six drawings are sorted into groups of twelve. Each group of twelve is layered by generation (mother_daughter_mother) and according to the photographic process by which the images were first collected. The drawings are also tinted in layers across each individual subject, so that of the twelve drawings of each subject, four of the drawings have one layer of tint, four drawings have two layers of tint, four drawings have three layers of tint. The three layers of tint are: sepia, blue/green, violet. Twelve drawings were drawn with a sepia colored pen with one layer of tint, twelve were drawn with a green/blue pen with two layers of tint, twelve were drawn with a violet pen, with three layers of tint. The colors and layers accumulate across the thirty-six drawings, in groups of twelve.

The subjects are related - mother, grandmother, daughter - these titles apply within the relationships of the subjects, and also to the subjects themselves (being a mother and grandmother, being a mother, daughter and grandmother, being a mother, daughter and granddaughter simultaneously). There is an aspect to the subjects that shifts perception of the subjects and their relationships. The oldest of the three does not appear socially conventional in her portraits. What is that look? What is that expression? What is the relationship between her expressions and the expressions of her daughter? What about her granddaughter? Is there a relationship across generations affected by this aspect?

The text is a conflation of dream and memory. Images of washing, water, river, flow, drowning, resuscitation; being a child, being a mother; are arranged in a 4/4 rhythm.

As a digital work, the piece juxtaposes three generations in relation to each other both in terms of subject relationships, and in terms of production relationships. There is a significance differential between being located at the left or the right side of the page, there is a significance differential associated with age, and there is a significance differential associated with rendering, depending on how the images are 'read'. As the page sits, open on a monitor, each generation is located, unpredictably, in relation to age, rendering and layout, to each other. As these shifting locations continue, there is no predictable arrangement, no pattern to be discerned within this movement. The work, as it exists in a digital environment is infinitely variable and unpredictable. An arhythmical pattern is used to program the shifting of the images.

This entire project evolved through a practice in portraiture as process. The portraits, in this piece, are drawings of three women in relation to each other through generations. The evolution of the concept and design took place over the course of three years.

Practicing portraiture as process embodies the notion of uncertainty and the humanity of the artist. There is no expectation that the 'brilliant' artist is going to capture the essence of a person in one dramatic portrait. The practice rejects the notion of essence, there is no essential person to make a portrait of, there is this complicated, complex, contexted human being. Through a multiplicity of sketches, capturing different persepctives, gazes, attitudes, perhaps a composite notion of the subject might be understood. At the same time, that understanding is a momentary construction of meaning conditional to the 'reading' of the piece. There is no essential viewer, there is another complicated, complex, contexted human being making sense of the work.

The artist is embedded in the work. The design of the process, the moment of rendering, the juxtaposition, the exhibition, these are all expressions of the artist's specificity as another complicated, complex, contexted human being. The subject, the viewer and artist all come into relationship through the exhibition of the work.

The first time the work was exhibited, it was in a gallery setting. The artist had arranged the drawings in series as a large flip book (each drawing is 16" tall x 12" wide. Throughout the opening night, the artist physically flipped the pages, creating the illusion of infinite possible combination. In reality, the pages were heavy and had to be lifted very carefully. The idea was there but the execution was somewhat cumbersome.