COMMON GROUND
COMMON GROUND
Before there was America the country, or the individual states and the ensuing territorial identities and politics, there was the land that America occupies. The ground (clay), the oceans, lakes, rivers (water) and the plants (trees / wood ash).
This project proposes to harvest those three foundational materials (clay, water, wood ash) from each of the 50 states, plus Washington DC and the five inhabited US Territories (Puerto Rico, The US Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa and Northern Mariana Islands). The materials will be mixed together to obliterate the political borders of their origins, and then used to create a body of work. Each piece that I make will represent the reintegration of the country at the most basic, material level.
There will be two parts of this project. One is to make a set of 56 Plates, 56 bowls and 56 cups. The second is a group of 56 objects.
The functional pieces (plate, bowl, cup) will be used to bring people together around food. One of the most effective and familiar ways to talk and find common ground is through sharing a meal. We will organize several meals in different locations around the country where these plates, bowls and cups will be used by all different kinds of people, eating different kinds of food and having different kinds of conversations, which will symbolically represent and celebrate the rich diversity of America.
The group of 56 objects will physically embody the earth, trees and water from each state and territory. I hope that they will abstractly represent both the differences and common ground that the states and territories share as a larger, unified group, or country.
The project will conclude with an exhibition and several meals.
The country is more divided and politicized now than ever before, and the next year is expected to be worse. My hope is that this project (made from the common ground of the country) will, in both a very literal / material way and a symbolic / abstract way, represent a (re)unification of the country.