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Lesley Patterson-Marx Artist’s Statement {back} (2001) I collect things daily. My work begins with collecting. I am interested in the stories attached to these objects that I collect, as they are lost, passed from owner to owner, and found again. On the way to my studio I found a piece of styrofoam(in the shape of Kentucky), a playing card (eight of diamonds), a piece of tree bark (also in the shape of Kentucky), another playing card(three of clubs). I have looked at the ground and at the edges of the sidewalk. I have looked in the drawers of the old desk in my grandmother’s basement. I have looked in boxes at The Salvation Army. I have looked at estate sales. I have looked in my father’s bureau. I have looked under my mother’s bed. I have looked under my fingernails, I have looked between my teeth, I have counted them over and over. I have counted the lines of my palms. I have counted all of my clothing. I have counted broken eggshells. It helps to count things. It fills time. I will find it if I count. It is somewhere to be found. I get closer to the end, but then I find myself back at the beginning. I see that it is a circle. I look in the mirror. I count my eyes. They are circles, my wristwatch, circle, the sun, circle, coins, circles, the moon, circle, bingo chips, circles, cracker, circle, dinner plate, circle, steering wheel, circle, button on my sweater, circle. The circles gather around me. I begin to collect them. Whose was this before it was mine? What does the number mean? How long will I wait? Did I find this? Did it find me? What is the sum of these parts? How do they fit together? I wonder why. who. what. where. when. how. If it is impossible to know, I pretend to know it. It is science, trying to know impossible things, trying to connect inanimate objects to people that have passed on, trying to form constellations from nails and string and tiny faces cut from photographs, trying to make maps of days I will forget. I will make an almanac that predicts the patterns of the seasons, that explains the trajectory that events tend to follow. I will record the growth of my hair through each season. I will collect to the point of absolute accumulation. I will collect until the impossibility of further accumulation is proven. At this moment, all that ascends will descend. I will lose my memory. Others have lost theirs. All of these things that I possess are lost from someone. There are holes in people, where the things they have lost no longer exist. These things belong to me now. Maybe the things were unwanted, or their owners were careless with them, or tired of them, or taken from them, or maybe these things possessed their own will and wanted to travel. They belong to me now. I take care of them. They tell my stories...{cont.} |
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