Showing and Telling Sweet Lies

Throughout this paper, I will lay out some of the underpinnings of my practice. My practice is multivalent; it ranges widely, draws from many sources and employs a multitude of media. It reflects my explorations in using the parafiction as a narrative device to investigate memories and history. It relies on research to explore backgrounds and linkages. It is about collections of objects as allegorical devices and the play with the archive, the Wunderkammer and museological tropes. My practice is an examination of the potential of the narrative and its narrator(s) to reveal the wonders of the everyday. This paper traces my investigation and analysis of the narrative as a means to understand fictions that deal with possibles and plausibles, specifically through the works of Mieke Bal, Manfred Jahn and Carrie Lambert Beatty. Referencing the films of Patrick Keiller and works by Rodney Graham I examine the role of the narrator, as a not always reliable guide, for uncovering forgotten, misplaced and speculative memories and histories. I reveal the narrator as “trickster” whose disclosure of information offers only clues and trace elements. The evolution of my own work, from just prior to and during the MFA, illustrates my material and theoretical explorations that have led to the body of work called Remote Viewer, presented in the 2018 MFA Graduate Exhibition. By referencing the practices of artists Susan Hiller, Mark Dion and Cornelia Parker, I illustrate how my play with everyday objects as allegorical devices operates in support of my speculative narratives. Similar to the practices of Tom Sachs and Richard E Prince, I employ models and dioramas to highlight the inherent magic of the sometimes futile attempt to replicate memories and events. This paper is also about the struggle to define and “own” my art practice. A practice that over the course of my MFA, through playful exploration and experimentation has developed faster than my theoretical “understanding” of how it operates. This “final” version is the next step in catching up and closing the gap.