Thursday, December 30, 2004

A newer linearity from the free throw line

The hiatus prompts a very useful dream. Suddenly the ground shoots up and new walls thrust toward the raftered ceiling. Or the open field, a wide expanse converging past either horizon line, ruptures as if from plate techtonics though not organically and fissured in a broken or shattered fashion but orderly and geometrical like neatly stacked Lego blocks. The terrain becomes a preNintendo video game landscape of sharp right angles gradually stepped into curved peaks or valleys. Lines that used to indicate increments, territory, stated goals are now thrown out-of-whack subverting its spatial identity (and metaphysical space).

Rethink actual markings as an overhead blueprint rather than demarcations and invert delineated flat planes (sometimes distinguished by color) into volumetric space. Extend the areas above, below, laterally, diagonally beyond the floor or ground to create new form which fractures the implied notions of border. The area, the surface constituting what is inbounds functions as figure that manufactures an exterior shell while what was out-of-bounds, its perimeter no longer acts strictly as the opposite ground is obliterated through the addition of perspectival directionality. Reinterpreting and transforming the field of play as such suggests a metaphorical dislocation that speaks of culture as well as politics too. Perhaps an appropriate model to use might be a scaled-down version as either maquette or sculptural object.