Katie Campbell Rojas and Professor Gary Barton, Visual Arts
Community House was a concept created to artistically represent individuals within a community. It was proposed that a group of 20 students and 2 professors would construct a house made up of 22 individual rooms. Furthermore, the house could easily be disassembled so that each artist might render his/her room personally. Although many doubted the completion of the structure, it was constructed by the deadline.
Upon its construction, Community House was an empty creation, much like a blank canvas, waiting for the artist to render it complete. However, just by looking at it, anyone would recognize it as a house, the environment’s fundamental building block. This was the desire of the students and myself, knowing that once each artist changed a room for individual representation, it would look very different.
Thus each artist was given a room to express themselves in, and associate with their individual lives. Along with the room, each person was required to write a personal artist statement to justify the artwork created. Therefore, when the rooms were completed collectively with the statements, the house was a collaboration of the ideas and characteristics of 22 individuals.
These ideas were reflections of very personal, or non-personal experiences had by each person. Joseph Ostraff, a professor in the Department of Visual Arts at BYU wrote of 3 relationships he had with the name David. They included his Jewish heritage, his birth name, and his child hood encounters with Michelangelo’s David. His room had abstract and representational images conceptualizing his statement. Jared Clark, a 6’5’’ BFA student, filled his room with a dismembered ceiling fan. His statement was, “ I often hit my head on the kitchen fan, sometimes violently.”
I created my own room by painting the box with black paint and applying hundreds of handmade stars to the inside. Within the room was placed layers of black screen to which more stars where applied. Finally, a black light was placed inside the box. Thus, when turned on the box glows and shifts as if one were on a miniature ride through outer space. Much like the rides I experienced as a child. Ergo, all the rooms together did truly become a community of individuals.
To expose our collaboration to the society around us, our house was displayed in different venues within Utah. During the month of April 2001, Community House was on exhibit in a fine arts gallery in Payson Utah. In June-July 2001, Community House was exhibited at the Art Front Community Space Gallery as part of their grand opening. Furthermore, we have submitted our statements and proposal to many galleries across the world. Currently we are arranging an exhibition in Milan, Italy. Our goal for this collaboration was to gain a greater understanding of the basis of society by exploring our own individuality within a community. All who participated agreed that it was a very successful and enlightening experience. We, the artists also gained a greater appreciation for the power of collaboration. It is felt by all participants that the ORCA grant gave us a great opportunity to creatively excel in our emergence into the contemporary art world.