PDX Art: interview with Dan Gilsdorf

the brilliant Art of Dan Gilsdorf
at www.Disjecta.org
more info at www.dangilsdorf.com





















Interiotrope: is this a title you came up with or does it exist already?

Interiotrope is a word that I made up; a google search will probably turn up very little. I came up with the title using some standard conventions (as I understand them) of scientific taxonomy, so Interiotrope is a sort of pseudo-scientific designation for the type of project I was hoping to start at the beginning of the process. The suffix “trope” refers to something--- typically an organism---that exhibits a physical response to outside stimuli; a heliotropic plant turns toward the sun for example whereas a thigmatrope responds to the touch of a solid object. Generally the response is to turn toward or away from the stimulus (tropos is greek for to turn) so I considered Interiotrope to be something that turns toward an interior in an exploratory way. There is also the association with zoetropes, thaumatropes, and other such visual effects mechanisms that rely on persistence of vision. Lastly, in a very loose way I was thinking of tropes themselves in the linguistic sense, which is when a word, phrase, or idea is used in a way inconsistent with its conventional meaning as in metaphor, metonymy, or synecdoche; these kinds of things are all types of tropes.

Which realms does it refer too?

If you mean physical realms, I’d say interiors, specifically the interiors of spaces and how we define their boundaries. Also the realms that are usually unseen that support physical structure: the insides of walls, the framing, the locations of structural elements. I was hoping to include these into the normal perceived space of an interior and so add a few cubic feet to the space without physically expanding it; just increase a viewer’s awareness and consideration of the space by the volume of the spaces in the walls.

I just wrote a little ditty on titles for PDX art
and wondered if you had considered anything other than Interiotrope. If yes, would you share them and also give a reason why you didn't take them?

Truth be told, I came upon the title of the show pretty early on in the process, before any of the actual work had begun. I didn’t have any alternates. The naming of things is important to me but I find that I can’t force it. Sometimes a title will emerge in the course of making a work, sometimes the title happens when I am still in the sketchbook stages, or sometimes I just end up using whatever I have been using to reference the work in my own notes and conversations. In rare cases the title has hit me first, then I have to come up with a physical work to fit. Often I fail to come up with anything at all and the work goes up untitled, which is okay with me.

Lots of art work seems to engage with gallery space lately.
What is the attraction and is there a message behind it?

I think that it is related to the experiments of the post-modernists, who really questioned the gallery space, especially in terms of legitimacy. Galleries, as we all now recognize, are not spaces free of context, nor free of prejudice so there’s a lot there to deal with. I don’t really think any artwork today that finds itself in a gallery can exist there without somehow engaging “gallery space”; the politics of it are such that there is no escape. Certainly the architecture of the space and especially the “gallery-ness” of it has a tremendous impact, so it is only fair that the artwork should assert itself. The post-modernist discourse on galleries has had this lasting impact on contemporary art--- the genie is out of the bottle as they say.


What is wrong with the traditional architecture of an exhibition space , and in your case the Disjecta building? How did it inform your choice or type of installation?

I don’t think there is anything wrong with traditional gallery architecture per se; there are a lot of different things going on out there. But all of them bear content that they add or subtract from the work and they need to be considered as integral for the time that the work exists in the space. A work of art has a life, it is an entity with a certain degree of agency; that is to say it can cause things to happen. They may be perceptual things, subtle things that happen only for a single viewer, but these things will happen differently according to the characteristics of the space. I see this as absolute-- for the period of time that a work of art is in a particular space, it truly consists of the synthesis of itself and the space.

In the case of Disjecta, there is no denying that it is a beautiful space. Spaces like that have a legitimizing effect on the work as art, which is something that all gallerists hope their space can accomplish. I think it is perfect for what I wanted to accomplish. As a non-commercial endeavor, Disjecta is freed from the constraints of the market to a certain extent, which is something that Portland desperately needs but has difficulty supporting. It’s also in a great location; a part of the city that is rich in many ways that benefit the artwork inside-- cultural energies that are well utilized in other cities, but neglected in Portland.


Is this a symbolic rebellion against the boundaries of the gallery walls or any other boundaries or limitations?

I don’t really intend for Interiotrope to be a rebellion, especially against boundaries. I think of it as more of an excavation; an exploration of hidden spaces and structures. I see boundaries as positive in some ways, boundaries are where interesting things happen, where mixing occurs and divergent tendencies and assumptions meet and have to deal with each other.

Space capitalized seems to be in the foreground of your artistic exploration.
What have you found so far and how do the new spaces like virtual space change our way of perception?

The nature of virtuality as I see it, and the new technologies that harness it, is that they have really turned ‘Space’ inside out--- expanded it many many times over without making it any bigger. Certainly they have dislodged Space from Time! I go back and forth on the notion of the legitimacy of virtual space. Sometimes it seems like we have created a vast collection of true fourth dimensions (I don’t think each navigable cyber-space constitutes its OWN dimension, but taken as a whole I think cyber-space certainly can operate like a parallel dimension). Other times I just feel like we have only created a more efficient iteration of basic tele-communication, one that offers more user options but is really just a top-down manner of advertising and teen-style social networking. Lately, however the more I think about and use the technologies of the virtual I really can’t deny their power and the profound changes they have made to many people’s lives. The dislocation of content from space and time was something I was very suspicious of at first, but I’m coming around!

What is your opinion on where our body ends and another substance begins and are there points that overlap?

I guess I still see the body as an absolute with clear boundaries, but I imagine that is about to change. My grandmother has two prosthetic hip joints, she doesn’t think about them in order to walk. They are now as unconscious to her as my natural hips are to me so in a way they have become integral to her conception of self. That, to me, is a blurred boundary. You’re familiar with the phenomenon of ghost limbs in amputees. When we begin to talk about the boundaries of substance concerning the body, we are getting into some very murky territories of psychology.

The centerpiece is a chandelier and is a classic beautiful piece, but also
confusing as it is lowered to the ground. What's the symbolism behind it?

At a certain point during the formulation of this whole project, I realized that I was leaving out some pretty important spaces in my excavation of interiors, namely virtual and negative space. The chandelier hangs low over a pan of ink which acts like a mirror and reflects the lights---they appear to exist below the concrete floor in a way. This was one way I thought I could breach the floor visually without renting a jackhammer. The crystals that hang off the bottom of the chandelier dip into the ink and the chandelier turns very slowly so in this way the fixture breaches and slightly disturbs the boundary between space and reflection.

Anything I could say about symbolism would be the result of after-the-fact analysis on my part--looking at and thinking about the finished work. As such, it is not that much different than the analysis of a viewer. In terms of symbolic content, many of these works remain very mysterious to me.

Are their metaphysical aspects in your installation?

I tend to think of all images as metaphysical in a certain way, not in terms of spirituality, but as in “beyond or transformed physicality”-- representations of the physical world. The people who viewed one of the first motion pictures, which featured an oncoming train, were frightened and scrambled to get out of the way. It seems a little ridiculous to us now, but at the time I’m sure that it was nothing short of a metaphysical experience. So in that sense; yes, maybe the whole show is about metaphysics, or at least meta-space. I am trying to engage the perceptions of space and cause the hidden inner structures of architectural interiors to re-emerge in the conscious awareness of the viewer.

What other work have you done and where have you shown previously?

This is my second solo show in Portland, the first being at Gallery 500 in 2005. Other solo exhibitions have been in Los Angeles and Roseburg, Oregon. My wife, Bean Gilsdorf, and I have shown collaborative work in Portland, LA, and Austin, Texas. There’s a list of group shows and what not; it’s all on my CV on the website.

Since about 2004 my work has dealt a lot with mechanism. I tend to conceive of ideas as motions, or simple sequences of things which occur repetitively in time. In 2006 I started to incorporate video and computer control to achieve what before I had to do mechanically. I have therefore had the chance to exhibit work in some film and video festivals and the like but still, sometimes simple mechanics is the best way to go.


What's up next for you?

Stephen Slappe, Mack McFarland, Mike Bray, and I have an exhibition of video installation work at the Marylhurst Art Gym in April.