Angela Rose Voulgarelis’ beaded works are three-dimensional drawings that can also be worn. She uses Morse code to translate particular texts, transforming them into physical objects of adornment. Her intention is to transcend Morse code’s original use as a vehicle for military code breaking to offer new possibilities of communication. The cyclical - at times arduous - act of creating each piece underscores repetitive activities typically
associated with “women’s work”. At the same time, the process reveals a common thread between meditative practice and everyday actions. The beads and/or stones chosen are equally important to the work, as the spiritual and mythical significance of the materials respond directly to each written work.
Both a poet and visual artist, Maya Pindyck uses text, visual imagery, and sound to subvert each other. Often drawn upon or next to a text, visual imagery is employed to rupture or question her written poems. Her work can be viewed as an evolving reinterpretation of what is written on the page. She does this, in part, by having different readers of various ages, backgrounds and ethnicities read the same text. The act of reading her poems while listening to recordings of different readers gives distinct voice to the poem and provides space to draw new meaning upon the page. She collaborates with Voulgarelis to bring yet another dimension of meaning to her poems and to ground them in a particular physicality.
Voulgarelis and Pindyck work collaboratively to translate Pindyck’s poetry into physical objects, using Morse code as a tool of transformation. By translating Pindyck’s words into three-dimensional objects, the media of poetry, drawing, and craft are set free from their traditionally accepted categories. No longer rooted in a linguistic system, Pindyck’s poems have the possibility to be understood in a different way – by the hand and by the body. The viewer is encouraged to bring his/her own experiences to each piece, as it exists as many things simultaneously: object, text, adornment, drawing. The act of writing, the process of translation, and the dynamic that is created between the artists transforms the way in which their work can be understood. Their collaboration encourages new connections to be drawn between the physical and the ephemeral, between the body and the mind, between language and communication, and between time and space.
Project Proposal:
We propose a site-specific performance at Articule gallery, where the gallery is transformed into our studio, and work is created in a collaborative way around the concepts of time and space. Articule Gallery becomes an intersection—a site that both facilitates the transparency of the artist’s process and encourages dialogue between the gallery and the public for a two week period.
When the performance begins, the only thing on view will be displayed on the gallery windows: photocopies of literature and visual investigations on the theme of time and space. The gallery itself will appear quite minimal, as there will only be two working tables facing each other in the middle of the space. The concepts of time and space will be placed in the proverbial center, around which both artists will generate work. As for the work, we plan to create poetry on the concepts of time and space, and translate the poems into three-dimensional strands of beads using Morse code. We will meditate upon, expand, challenge, and share ideas on a daily basis. As one never knows where the artistic process can lead, only time and space will tell what work will result. The gallery doors will be open to the public each day for these two weeks to encourage discussion
and participation on the themes of time and space.
We plan to have video, audio, and photographic documentation recording the daily progression of work created in Articule’s space during this time. The work and the artists would be on view throughout. At the end of the two weeks, all the work will be removed, leaving only the two desks as a visual marker that anyone had been there at all.
Sending this into the universe - wish us luck
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