deankessmann

Plant Detritus

polaroid prints, iris prints, plant detritus, various sizes, 2002
edition 1/1 (piles of plant detritus no longer exists)

polaroid prints, iris prints,
plant detritus, various sizes,
2002
edition 1/1 (piles of plant
detritus no longer exists)

Read a short description of this project

Plant Detritus

During the spring of 2002 I began noticing interesting clusters of leaves, seeds, pine needles, and other plant detritus on the driveway between my apartment building and the garage. Every day there were new additions to the piles as their formations constantly changed. The small Polaroid prints are documents of the way that I found the plant material on the sidewalks and streets. They capture the way they looked when I stumbled upon them, before I scooped them up and sealed them into ziplock bags to bring to my studio. Later the Polaroid prints served as the points of reference in the re-formation of the shapes on my studio floor to be re-photographed, and then, once again, reassembled directly on the floor of a gallery. The dialogue that takes place between the Polaroid prints, Iris prints, and the rearrangement of the actual material in this body of work, at the time, was the latest point of departure in my practice—the intersection of documentary photography and installation strategies. My goal was to preserve the original formation of the plant detritus throughout the entire exhibition; however, it soon became apparent that the various incarnations of the piles were far more different at each stage than they were the same. Unlike photographic reproduction, where nearly identical copies can be endlessly produced, it was impossible to piece back such a complex puzzle, such a chaotic distribution of matter. Attempting such a task heightened my appreciation for chance occurrences, while at the same time fulfilling my desire to create an illusion of control over the materials that may very well be in control of us.