A photograph of a large oval wooden structure in a white walled room on a concrete floor.
Energy Fields: Vibrations of The Pacific
Sep
15
2024
Dec
13
2024
Jan
19
2025
The Body: Site, Image Possibility

A Curatorial Perspective of Two Objects

Our exhibition, Energy Fields: Vibrations of the Pacific, prompts a consideration of the material and immaterial vibrations that surround us. While our experience of the world is shaped by encounters with vibrations, the limitations of our anatomies make our observation of them finite and conditional. Our bodies are our first point of contact with the world, and the receivers of sensory input which shapes our most fundamental understanding. The works in this exhibition, including the two works chosen for this educational resource, reveal perceptions of vibrational energies beyond those we can glean with our limited sensory apparatus. Virginia Katz’ work enlists the wind as a body. WIND, On-Shore Flow, 7 Hours of Observation makes visible in a metallic “painting” the vast energies of a localized wind event. Steve Roden’s ear(th) translates data of the effects of the earth’s movement during an earthquake, into a score for a sound composition. Both works are revelatory, making visible or audible waves of energy that we cannot bodily perceive without the intervention of these artists.

Exhibition page. 

Fulcrum Arts co-presented with Chapman University

1 University Drive, Orange County

MON-FRI:12pm-5pm
SAT:11am-4pm
SUN:CLOSED

For group tours:shen@chapman.edu
A drawing with a black background and white dots that look like the Milky Way.
On-Shore Flow - 7 Hours of Observations, Green and Blue, 3/28/08, 2008, Virginia Katz. Metallic ink on black paper. Photo by Gene Ogami.2024 © Virginia Katz. All rights reserved.
On-Shore Flow - 7 Hours of Observations, Green and Blue, 3/28/08, 2008, Virginia Katz. Metallic ink on black paper. Photo by Gene Ogami.2024 © Virginia Katz. All rights reserved.
A photograph of a large oval wooden structure in a white walled room on a concrete floor.
"ear(th)," 2004, Steve Roden. Courtesy of the artist and Williamson Gallery ArtCenter College of Design. Photograph by Steve Heller. ©Steve Rhoden.
"ear(th)," 2004, Steve Roden. Courtesy of the artist and Williamson Gallery ArtCenter College of Design. Photograph by Steve Heller. ©Steve Rhoden.

Discussion Questions

  • In what ways can artists extend the limits of human sensory capabilities?
  • Discuss the variability in the ways humans can detect vibrations? Expand this discussion to the non-human world.
  • What role can technology play in expanding our abilities to perceive the world?

Bibliographic References

Lawrence English, “Relational Listening: A Politics of Perception,” Contemporary Music Review 36, no. 3 (2017): 127–42.https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07494467.2017.1395141
Christoph Cox, “Beyond Representation and Signification: Toward a Sonic Materialism,” Journal of Visual Culture 10, no. 2 (August 2011): 145–61https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1470412911402880
Christopher Knight, Steve Roden, a vivaciously inventive artist, dies at 59," Los Angeles Times, 8 September, 2023. Steve Roden, a vivaciously inventive artist, dies at 59 - Los Angeles Timeshttps://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2023-09-08/steve-roden-obituary-artist-los-angeles