MICHELE PRED: (DIS)POSSESSIONS
June 15-October 12, 2008
Michele Pred, Double Edged, Mixed media.
How important to you are your personal items? What does it mean to you when they are taken away? Michele Pred (CA) investigates these questions with sculptures made of materials confiscated at airport security the checkpoints since 9/11. Pred believes that “seeing these ordinary objects, most of them so seemingly harmless, as imbued with the potential for danger may make us laugh, as well as make us angry. The complexity of our response echoes the objects themselves; each small tool, like each of us, bears some of the weight of a changed world.”
Made of objects such as lighters, nail clippers, pocketknives, razor blades, scissors, and other belongings, the artist’s sculptures deal with both personal and shared memories. Mundane items that individually may have significance only to their owners form images laden with universal meanings in Pred’s new groupings. For example, Double Edged, a United States map created with confiscated razor blades, illustrates recurring themes of safety, security, collecting, memory, consumerism, and globalization.