I saw it and I just knew you'd love it
This essay was written to accomapny the exhibition Shattered: New Work by Cristina Misuraca at the Ian Gates Gallery.
It's happened to all of us at some time or other in our life. There you are, your parents have gone away, you're in charge of the house, and you decide to invite a few friends over. And there, on the mantelpiece, is a statuette. Not just any statuette, but your mothers favourite, brought on a holiday years ago.
You're sitting there, and can only watch as a friend brushes past. It wobbles. Then, as if in slow motion, it falls. It hits the floor. Pieces go flying in all directions. You let out a loud shout 'Noooooo!!!' Sorry, I was getting carried away there. The point of this little piece of theatricality is actually leading to the event that follows. The bit where you spend the rest of the night attempting to find all the pieces, and then, armed with a tube of superglue, you carefully, very carefully, try and stick it back together again.
After hours of reconstructive surgery you finally stand and announce "There. Good as new!" But it rarely is.
This is the point where Cristina's work begins. She takes objects, usually statuettes, or more recently larger items, and breaks them. Where everyone else takes great care not to break things, Cristina takes great joy in smashing them. She then puts them back together again using all manner of 'sticky things' from glue to sellotape, from string to wire. She reconstructs the original object, but in the process she creates an entirely new object. It would be tempting to say that she reconstructs the work imperfectly, but to say this would be to miss the point completely. If the work was reassembled so that there was no trace of it ever being broken, it would simply remain a statuette, something that had been brought for the sole purpose of decoration. As it is, Cristina breathes new life into something that would have lived out an otherwise banal and uneventful life.
Her work stems from the idea that the objects that we choose to surround ourselves with can often say a lot more about us than actual words. A while ago she did some work that looked at the idea of transplanting something that would normally only be seen inside the house, and putting it outside into a public domain, almost like you are exposing a part of yourself. In her current work she continues this idea further. The objects she uses are all objects more usually found in a living room than an art gallery, but by 'altering' them she gives them an entirely new level of interest. The work is reminiscent of some pieces by Jeff Koons, who also made use of everyday statuettes. The kind that you often find in gift shops at airports, where you see a shelf that is just covered with hundreds of identical statues. Millions are sold each year, and now sit on shelves all over the world. Koons enlarged them to parody the modern society that buys these things, he took each one and reproduced in perfect detail, only larger, thus producing a individual piece of work. Cristina takes the same objects, but instead of enlarging them she deconstructs them, then reconstructs them, but with a difference. Like a cubist painting, her work allows you to see things that you wouldn't normally be able to see. If you had one of these on your mantelpiece you could be certain that you had a truly unique object.
The inspiration for this group came when "My Mum broke an ornament that had belonged to my Nan, and I saw how upset she was." (Cristina Misuraca, November 2000). It was interesting how such a small inanimate object could cause such an emotional response. But it's true. These objects that we surround ourselves with often have memories attached to them. They remind us of the person that brought them for us, or of a holiday we went on, and so forth. Yet ultimately they are nothing more than (quite often) a cheap piece of china, made to look like some thing or other. These objects become so weighed down with memories, that when it breaks, even if it's only slightly, it often feels like a part of us has broken with it.
A lot of her recent works have been based on a container of some kind, ranging from a trinket box to a large vase. The human body is often referred to in terms of being a container, or a vessel. This is very true in terms of science, whereby our body contains all our organs that are so necessary to life. It also contains our DNA which defines who we are. On a more spiritual level our body is often seen as a temporary residence for our soul, or our spirit. In some religions we are told that we will be reborn into another body, and depending on our actions in this life we may come back in a human body, or some other creature. In other religions we are told that we only get one chance and that this body is therefore extremely precious, and should be looked after at all costs. These ideas come to mind when we look at the objects she chooses. There is a person, a horse, ducks, and even an angel. When we look at the damaged bodies, it makes us more aware of the frailty of our bodies, and the ever increasing need to protect them. This is emphasised even more in her piece untitled (blocks) where the objects, already showing signs of wear and tear themselves have been placed into a small alcove that has been specially cut out of breeze blocks. In this way the idea of the container is emphasised, as there is now a container for the container. The pieces when considered individually take on an almost religious feel. They are reminiscent of the alcoves that can be found in churches, where a statue of a saint will be placed ready for worship. However Cristina has chosen to show them in a group of four, laying on the floor, leaning against each other. In this way the religious implications are played down, and we begin to look at them in the sense of being a protective container for the work. It's as if the objects themselves are so fragile that they need to be encased in a stone container for safety. In many ways this may be true. When we consider the importance that these objects hold in our lives, in terms of the memories they represent, it may be a good idea to place them into stone containers to prevent them from being broken, but then they become difficult to view, and since that is the main point in buying these statuettes, that would seem a silly idea. But of course the idea that people can become so attached to these little items may also seem preposterous. This is one of the paradoxes that Cristina's work asks us to question. Of course this doesn't alter the fact that we still choose to surround ourselves with these objects.
Our entire history can often be summed up with the objects we surround ourselves with. If you look around your house, there will be so many objects that are a part of your history. Something you were given by a loved one on a particular birthday, or a signed photograph from that time you met someone famous. Perhaps it's a black spot on the roof of your kitchen from when you set light to your dinner. All around us are memories, often overlooked, until something acts as a reminder. It is often interesting when you visit someone's house, as you sit there and look around you start to notice things. Sometimes they are quite expected, sometimes quite unexpected. They often allow you to make deductions about where they went on holiday the year previously, or what sort of sport they're into. But sometimes the objects can be misleading. It maybe that the object isn't theirs at all, or maybe someone brought it for them. Cristina's work presents us with a similar problem. How much can we deduce about the artist from the work presented? She leaves us guessing as to whether the objects presented are her own personal statues, or whether they were brought in specially for the occasion. In the same way that we are often left to guess as to whether a particular object in someone's house is really theirs, or if it is simply being looked after. This paradox, exists with any statuette though. Because we can never fully share the memories that exist within any one piece of statuary, we are constantly left to make up our own memory. In the same way as we are here required to form our own memory of the work. By knowing the relation of these objects to the artist, we are prevented from forming our own relationship with the object.
When we are presented with an object in this state, whereby we don't know anything about it's history, we begin to make our own deductions about it's past. An interesting notion here is that when it becomes a part of your history, you also become a part of it's history.
Cristina's method of working emphasises this. By showing the joins, and the way that it is held together, the work is not only given character, but is also given a past. We know that certain events have taken place. We can see the 'scars' of those events. In much the same way that we have scars from past events in our life. We begin to empathise with the objects. It has a history, which extends back into the past. It's history may only be a few weeks old, or it may be centuries old. When we look at an object in a museum, we accept that it is hundreds or thousands of years old because we have been told this. It is often more interesting though to look at the object, and see for ourselves the way that it has aged, look for clues about the life of the work. Cristina's work presents us with plenty of opportunities for this kind of analysis. We can see how the work has been made, the way that it has been put together. This all constitutes a part of the history of the object. This is in many ways similar to the 'Flag' paintings done by Jasper Johns in the 1950's, where he used encaustic. The encaustic mixed with paint meant that every single brush stroke was captured. By looking at the surface of the painting you could read the history of the painting, see how it was created. Cristina's work acts in this same way, where you can see how each piece was carefully reconstructed, and put back together again.
There is one more element that needs to be addressed. Cristina's work addresses issues of the past, both the object's and the viewers, but it also makes reference to Cristina's past, or at least memories of. People like Tracy Emin and Richard Billingham have recently produced work that takes a very close look at something that is very personal to them, her past, his family. All the pieces presented here have something about them that is connected either with the artist or her memories. On one piece there are little roles of paper that can be taken out and looked at. They contain mini photocopies of photographs taken by the artist when she went to see her Grandparents in Sicily last year. This is echoed by the miniature photo album that accompanies another piece. One has strands of her hair woven into it and mixed with the glue, and so on.
There has been much said recently about the relationship between contemporary art and advertising. A lot of art work being produced today has an extremely slick, polished feel to it, but ultimately feels empty. It is refreshing to see an artist who has chosen not to follow this road, and instead has allowed the more tactile properties of the work to shine through. The work presented here manages to combine a good old fashioned hands on approach, with an extremely thought provoking content.
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