Post by deanna on Mar 6, 2013 11:52:34 GMT -7
"LAST MONUMENTS"
An exhibition of recent works by Frol Boundin
SCA Contemporary Art
524 Haines Ave. NW, Albuquerque, NM 87102
March 8th - April 12th
Opening Reception: March 8th, 5-8 PM
Artist’ lecture: April 5th, 4 PM. UNM CFA Room 143.
Closing Reception: April 12th, 5-8 PM
Please visit www.boundinpress.com
or www.scacontemporary.com
for more information and images.
OZYMANDIAS
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lays, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
History is over.
We live in a temporary society. In recent times all things have become disposable: philosophy and culture, politics and ideologies, memory and history, life and death. Humanity no longer aspires to create enduring symbols of its own experience. We rely on television and Internet for the creation, preservation, and disposal of our identities. All dreams have become fleeting; all memories are reduced to a sound bite. And so the monuments of the 20th century lie, quite literally, in the dust. As humanity struggles with the evaluation of recent history, it rejects those symbolic structures. In amnesia of political correctness, society is ignoring the reminders of events that brought it to the brink of abyss.
"Last Monuments" is an exploration of what remains. All over the world symbols of once potent ideas and aspirations decay into rubble. From grand visions of communist dictators to the daydreams of California fishermen, only empty shells remind us of the pasts that still ring with the possibilities of different futures. The snapshot images of these objects are the foundations for new monuments. Found through extensive searches of anonymous databases, lifted from obscurity out of the darkest corners of the Internet, transformed by carful layering of colors and forms and presented as nostalgic glimpses into ourselves. They are intended as reminders, that we are quickly losing our sense of wonder and imagination. That no longer are we accustomed to the contemplation of the past or to preservation of its symbols as atonement for our mistakes. That without the continuity of visual memory there is no history.
An exhibition of recent works by Frol Boundin
SCA Contemporary Art
524 Haines Ave. NW, Albuquerque, NM 87102
March 8th - April 12th
Opening Reception: March 8th, 5-8 PM
Artist’ lecture: April 5th, 4 PM. UNM CFA Room 143.
Closing Reception: April 12th, 5-8 PM
Please visit www.boundinpress.com
or www.scacontemporary.com
for more information and images.
OZYMANDIAS
I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lays, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
History is over.
We live in a temporary society. In recent times all things have become disposable: philosophy and culture, politics and ideologies, memory and history, life and death. Humanity no longer aspires to create enduring symbols of its own experience. We rely on television and Internet for the creation, preservation, and disposal of our identities. All dreams have become fleeting; all memories are reduced to a sound bite. And so the monuments of the 20th century lie, quite literally, in the dust. As humanity struggles with the evaluation of recent history, it rejects those symbolic structures. In amnesia of political correctness, society is ignoring the reminders of events that brought it to the brink of abyss.
"Last Monuments" is an exploration of what remains. All over the world symbols of once potent ideas and aspirations decay into rubble. From grand visions of communist dictators to the daydreams of California fishermen, only empty shells remind us of the pasts that still ring with the possibilities of different futures. The snapshot images of these objects are the foundations for new monuments. Found through extensive searches of anonymous databases, lifted from obscurity out of the darkest corners of the Internet, transformed by carful layering of colors and forms and presented as nostalgic glimpses into ourselves. They are intended as reminders, that we are quickly losing our sense of wonder and imagination. That no longer are we accustomed to the contemplation of the past or to preservation of its symbols as atonement for our mistakes. That without the continuity of visual memory there is no history.