Interplanetary Death Star

Friday, March 7th - Sunday, March 30th, 2008
Brent Wahl

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION

A stadium or arena can come in many forms and can serve many purposes from accommodating soccer crowds and political rallies to religious gatherings and refuge. In the installation, which I think of as a drawing, the stadium represents an intersection between architecture, entertainment, container and cage.

Specifically, an arena reflects the society that it serves, and in every way it inherently represents the spectacle. There is an immense amount of power inherent in an arena and it presents itself most poignantly with the sensation of unity. Despite this, it can also represent a lurking darkness. These structures have the ability to undermine their purpose in the forms of latent volatility and impending chaos, overcrowding and even death.

The installation at Vox consists of an aluminum foil stadium and 550 2” x 2” images. These images are introduced into a ‘super stadium’ that functions as a framework and housing for the darker issues that we grapple with historically and in the media each day – it is a response to societal frustration, fear, and the misunderstanding of human nature.