Biography: Tim
McMichael (b. 1972) graduated from the Art Academy of Cincinnati
in 1994. He's since worked with many other artists and writers
including Jay
Bolotin, Mark
Flanigan, Mark Fox, Dave Rohs, and Aralee
Strange. He co-founded Volk C.S.P.I. ;a two month hyper
active performance exhibition space in Over The Rhine, (Cincinnati
Ohio) in the summer of 2000. He has since been showing locally
and regionally. His show 'Linked' opens at the Weston
Art Gallery Sept. 16 and runs through Nov. 12. He and
girlfriend Ali Edwards are currently expecting a baby boy,
due October 28th, 2005.
Statement:
Before:
Joy Division, Unknown Pleasures (1979)—the album cover
image of the first recorded pulsar, CP 1919 (the visual signature
captured in radio waves), published in The Cambridge Encyclopedia
of Astronomy, 1969, selected by Peter Hook, the bass player
of Joy Division.
Begin:
Exploring the building in which my studio is located, the David
Shoe Co., I discovered a piece of Masonite in a deserted bathroom.
When I first saw it, I was not certain what it was but nonetheless
instantly recognized it as something aesthetically commanding.
It wasn’t until later, after I brought it to my studio,
that I realized the artifact (which was last dated in 1969)
was actually comprised of a series of names, dates, drawings
of cars and the Apollo Lander, and multiplication tables calculating
how many seconds there are in a day, week, month, decade, etc.
That and a simple line game—evidently all by the hand
of Jim Paul Emmons, who I can only assume worked at the David
Shoe Co. from at least 1956 to 1969.
The drawing is a rectangle divided in half horizontally. The
top half of which is divided in half vertically, while the bottom
half is also divided into three equal parts vertically. The
object of the game is to pass a drawn line (unbroken) through
each separate segment of the divided box without crossing the
same segment twice. Simple enough, but Emmons found it daunting.
There are more than forty examples of his frustrated attempts
to find the solution time and time again with an X on every
place he crossed a line twice. And next to, or on top of these,
his calculations for how many seconds are in a century; all
this in an effort to understand, or placate, his sense of order
or chaos.
At the same time, I was listening to a box set by Joy Division
(Heart and Soul, 1997), and I recalled the image for Unknown
Pleasures. I was curious as to what the cover actually was and
why it was chosen. I tracked down the aforementioned info and
included the title on some material studies I was working on.
I started making parallels to Emmon’s scribbling and the
band’s inclusion of the pulsar radiograph.
Peter Hook and Jim Paul Emmons were onto something that I found
very curious. The latter constantly checking his time against
the bathroom wall measuring stick, and the former choosing an
image of a dying star; both chronicling and preserving their
place in time and, in doing so, trying to find order, leaving
their identifying marks.
Evidence / Artifact / Fossil.
Now:
Maps represent a significant construct of our identities.
Linked is not only waking modern amber, but also investigating
the need to document one’s place in impermanence.
Identity / Time / Oblivion.
Tim
McMichael
Title
| Polar Fibernacci
Title
| Untitled (Material Study)
Title
| Untitled (Material Study)
Title
| Shellac'd #2
Title
| Ohio Honeycomb
Title
| Untitled
Title
| Mutated Illinios Pennsylvania Oxeye Daisy'
Title
| Untitled
Title
| Polar Stalk
Title
| Route
Title
| Hive
Title
| Hemisphere Bop
Title
| Transformer
Title
| Current
Title
| 'Mutated Ohio Morning Glory'
Title
| Managed
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