Join us in the Gallery Space on Wednesday, January 11from 4 – 8 p.m. for the opening of the exhibit: Paho Mann – CONSUMED. We are pleased to announce that the artist will also give a public lecture at 3 p.m. that day in the gallery. All are welcome to attend these free events. (more below)
Bellevue College Art Faculty Chad White has curated this exhibit featuring artist Paho Mann’s photographs from his North Gateway Transfer Station Project.
To create the images, Mann made nearly 6000 photographs of individual recyclables at a solid waste transfer and material recovery station in Phoenix, Arizona. He selected the objects at random from the incoming recyclables from the city’s curbside recycling program and photographed them isolated against a black background in an on-site lighting studio.
By sampling a relatively small amount of waste (5824 objects from an excess of 100,000 tons of recycling processed in Phoenix each year) and further narrowing the selection with keywords, consumer choices become more specific. The resulting images attempt to show particular objects — not the abstract understanding of the hundreds of millions of tons of waste created in the United States each year.
During the year that Mann worked on the North Gateway Transfer Station Project (Fall 2007-Fall 2008) environmental awareness hit a new high in social and political dialogs. For the artist, awareness took two major forms. First, that the current rate of consumption of resources is unsuitable, posing a global environmental threat; and second, that this same consumption pattern has weakened the world economy. Central to Mann’s understanding of this project is that looking at what we own and consume reveals something about our identity and culture, and that this examination underlines the importance of making thoughtful choices in what we do with these objects.
This exhibit is being funded by Bellevue College ASG, Student Programs, and the Student Environmental Sustainability Fund (SESF). Keep your eyes openfor sustainability-related activities and “teachable moments” that students have organized to coincide with the timing of this exhibit.
More information about the exhibit and the artist will be posted on the Gallery Space Web site at http://bellevuecollege.edu/artshum/galleryspace and on our Facebook page (see below.)
Please contact Gallery Director Ross Brown at rbrown@bellevuecollege.edu or by phone at 564-2788 if you have questions or need special accommodations.
See you in January!
Last Updated November 19, 2013