Event

Transmission, Carriage, and Objects of Loss and Love

In March of 2018, Matty Davis and Ben Gould shared Carriage for the first time at Queenslab, a new space founded by artist Jim Hodges. Following the performance, Queenslab invited Davis and Gould to share Carriage again, and to possibly present an extended vision of the principles that guide the work.

This exhibition is a response to Queenslab's invitation, drawing together work from other practices, objects, rituals and phenomena: seismic recordings from the American West, a puppet used to mourn through dance at night, a transplanted garage from Louisiana.

Impulse is posited as primary force - unknown impulse reorienting Earths crust, the impulse to mourn and usher, the impulse to save and rebuild, the impulse of a neurotransmitter in the brain, and the impulse to care. These catalysts, together in their varied forms, examine energetic scale, notions of intimacy and love, and roles of utility and emotion in contemporary practices and historical objects.

Works on view include Transmission, a sound installation by Jacob Kirkegaard, and Carriage, a site-responsive performance by Matty Davis and Ben Gould. Transmission consists of audio recordings from both above and below Earth's surface. It combines above-ground field recordings with seismic vibration recordings of the ambient resonance of rock arches located around Native American Tribal lands. Carriage radically explores control and empathy, motored in part by the raw energy of Gould's Tourette Syndrome. It is informed by evolving senses of the body - injury, trauma, healing, and growth - and draws from the variance of Davis and Gould's distinct physicalities. The exhibition also features objects from different parts of the world and radically different cultures, common in their materiality, distinct in their function, and united in their concern for life.