Cutting.

Cutting.

Two Stories.

Warning 36.

Distant Equation.

An Exercise in Section.

An Exercise in Section.

‘Cutting’ is an exercise in dissection and arrangement.

Objects and body parts were cut from their original context, dissected from the conditions in which they were identifiable.

These parts, when cut, became pieces, independent of their original narrative. They were then able to be read as individual pieces or parts arranged in no order other than that of linear symmetry.

By collecting the parts into groupings of five and composing them in a ordered arrangement within an A4 sheet they became parts of a collection. The pieces became parts of a whole.

As parts of a whole, the pieces are able to be read and interpreted by the reader.These compositions become stories. The information of each piece becomes integral to an understanding of the narrative of the representation. Scenarios or situations can be read from the combined images.

The first level of reading occurs during the readers engagement with the images, the dissected pieces.

The vertical placement of pieces implies a hierarchy, a top to bottom reading, the upper row behaving as the first sentence.

The collective pieces allude to action or activity, space, and movement. Dimensioning of space can be deduced from the scale of the pieces, the closer hand viewed in relation to the further hand of ‘Intimacy’ gives to depth in the image, a foreground and a background.

Again, the vertical alignment of pieces has a role in the reading. The placement of lights in the upper row of ‘Meat’ hints at spatial dimensions, and the specific lighting type hinting at atmosphere.

Text acts as the second layer of information., both as title and as image.

In ‘Intimacy’ the addition of text acts as ekphrasis, or a clew, suggesting the narrative of the grouped pieces. The text “Her His Leg Arm Over” and “Me” are separated into two bags and positioned on either side of the page. The shift from possessive pronoun to dative [objective] pronoun insinuates two characters, reinforced by the hands placed directly beneath.

In contrast to this is the behavior of the introduced text in ‘Intellect’. Here the text acts as gloss. It is apparent that it has been added as notation, but to what the reader is unsure. The reader is intentionally misled.

In both cases the title implies a general thematic to the narrative.

These dissections illustrate that, while only providing a small amount of information to the reader, they are able to provide a large amount of information to the narrative when combined with the other four of their group. The objects and body parts, plus the addition of text, act as means by which the reader can decipher a story from coded parts.

While ‘Cutting’ is not an exercise in the creation of an explicit or ‘buildable’ architecture, it is an exercise in: the use of the tools of representation; the cutting and coding of pictorial pieces; and the interpretation of a ‘whole’ through an active reading of ‘parts’.

Intellect.

Intimacy.

Ten Stories.

Baking.

Hygiene.

Intellect.

Intimacy.

Leaving.

Meat.

Party.

Tea.

Waiting.

Workshop.

Katherine a. Roberts