Subject Sitting in Darkened Room
鈥淪ubject sitting in darkened space is told to watch a dot of light and draw a record of its movement on a paper. Dot is actually stationary. But to most normal people is seems to move around, describing a wandering, irregular track.鈥� In a scientific experiment described in LIFE magazine of 22 October 1956 in a article titled 鈥淣ew avenues into sick minds鈥� scientists found that so-called 鈥渘ormal鈥� people reacted differently to a source of light when sitting in a dark room than schizophrenic patients. The use of chemical drugs had just recently been pioneered in mental hospitals and changed the perception of mental illness. Experiments as the one described tantalized the scientists鈥� hope that 鈥渕ental sickness may involve measurable body chemistry as much as it does elusive psychic phenomena.鈥�
This exhibition is a study of the color black. And similar to the experiment of a subject sitting in darkened room, told to watch a dot of light, it starts with the physical and chemical characteristics of the color black. Over the course of the exhibition, the symbolic nature of black will become more evident and move into the historical and political meaning of the color black. Throughout the exhibition, works will be exchanged to form new relationships and meanings with other works on view, and move from a focus on physical and chemical aspects of the color black to symbolic meanings, to study the historical and political connotation in a second exhibition, running from October 30 to December 19.
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鈥淪ubject sitting in darkened space is told to watch a dot of light and draw a record of its movement on a paper. Dot is actually stationary. But to most normal people is seems to move around, describing a wandering, irregular track.鈥� In a scientific experiment described in LIFE magazine of 22 October 1956 in a article titled 鈥淣ew avenues into sick minds鈥� scientists found that so-called 鈥渘ormal鈥� people reacted differently to a source of light when sitting in a dark room than schizophrenic patients. The use of chemical drugs had just recently been pioneered in mental hospitals and changed the perception of mental illness. Experiments as the one described tantalized the scientists鈥� hope that 鈥渕ental sickness may involve measurable body chemistry as much as it does elusive psychic phenomena.鈥�
This exhibition is a study of the color black. And similar to the experiment of a subject sitting in darkened room, told to watch a dot of light, it starts with the physical and chemical characteristics of the color black. Over the course of the exhibition, the symbolic nature of black will become more evident and move into the historical and political meaning of the color black. Throughout the exhibition, works will be exchanged to form new relationships and meanings with other works on view, and move from a focus on physical and chemical aspects of the color black to symbolic meanings, to study the historical and political connotation in a second exhibition, running from October 30 to December 19.
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