MACRO vs micro:

AS220 Main Gallery
Oct 2-30, 2021

MACRO vs micro, the latest solo exhibition of photo prints, sculptural work and projection art by Providence-based installation artist Teddy Trocki-Ryba, was on view from Oct 2-30th, 2021 at AS220's Empire St Gallery, with an opening on Oct 2 from 4-6pm.

MACRO vs micro: artist’s statement

COVID-19 lockdowns have given the public time to think, but limited the number of things for us to think about. During this time of isolation we have all been forced to confront the relationship between our individual behavior/family lives and the political and physical health of our larger society. For many, work and public life were put on hold. In some instances, this unique situation temporarily severed the common middle ground of social life in between the individual/familial (micro) experience and the larger (macro) experience of community, government and world politics.

For the first time, a large population of the public simultaneously turned away from the public spaces of community and labor and looked into the lenses of social, corporate and indie media to make sense of the world outside of the reach of their newly isolated experience. Family life changed, with some brought closer and others further separated by political or physical distance. New forms of social tracking, both physical and intellectual, were tested and deployed out of necessity to track the spread of physical disease, and online disinformation surrounding the 2020 US election. Reality tunnels, already worming their way out of the podcast apps, newsfeeds and social media doom-scrolls, and into the brains of the masses, were hypercharged by heightened anxieties and an increased separation between private life and the public experience of the state.

While lockdowns are easing up, the question remains; how did this split experience alter the relationship between our individual life, local society and participation in government policy, as well as the way we relate to the outside world on the individual and national level?

Created during the 2020 lockdown and the autumn of 2021, on the eve of the 20th anniversary of 9/11, the work displayed in MACRO vs micro seeks to juxtapose the MACRO experience of community and government with the micro experience of family and individual life. These 3D printed sculptures were created through the use of "photogrammetry," a process by which a series of photographs is used to create a digital 3D scan of a real-world object or space.

Some scans in MACRO vs micro are presented with photo prints of their corresponding "texture file." This is a 2D photo file which the computer wraps across the surface of the untextured 3D file (as seen in the 3D printed sculptures) in order to reproduce a photorealistic 3D facsimile on a computer or smartphone. Other sculptures are presented with projectors or television screens showcasing animations made using the fully textured model. One sculpture, "Wyatt Detention Center" is also presented with a monitor showing a music video in which the scan data was used. The music video shown was also selected to be the official music video for "The Hate is Real" as part of a fan-made video contest for Ice-T's punk band "Body Count."

Also included are a series of scans of government buildings created from crowd sourced imagery. These scans were created using found footage which was not shot with the intention of being used for photogrammetry. Due to their limited number of camera angles, the results in these found footage scans appear to be uglier in nature, with a good deal of missing geometry, visual glitchiness and much less precision.

One such scan, "Fort Meade," was created from just 42 stills extracted from a 49 second video clip, and draws inspiration from Trevor Paglen's photograph of the famous NSA base in Maryland.

These MACRO scans are contrasted by a series of micros, expressions of individual life and the experience of family--including several scans of children's toys which were created in collaboration with students as part of a digital arts class at the Jamestown Arts Center. The pieces are titled with the name of the stuffed animal first, followed in parentheses by the name of the student who brought it in as part of the activity.

The paradigm shift in public perception, policy and technology surrounding the individual's relationship to privacy and the state that has taken place as a result of the pandemic and recent US political climate is only beginning to be understood, and cannot be fully appreciated without the benefit of hindsight. MACRO vs micro serves as a jumping off point, and hopes to inspire viewers to develop their own understanding of the collective issues of consent surrounding surveillance, policy-making and mass media culture, as well the ways in which those collective issues impact the individual experience of citizenship, community and family.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ABOUT AS220

Our Vision

AS220 envisions a just world where all people can realize their full creative potential.

Mission

We, the people of Rhode Island, associate ourselves for the purpose of providing a local forum and home for the arts, through the maintenance of residential and work studios, galleries, performance and educational spaces. Exhibitions and performances in the forum will be unjuried, uncensored and open to the general public. Our facilities and services are made available to all artists who need a place to exhibit, perform, or create their original artwork, especially those who cannot obtain space to exhibit or perform from traditional sources because of financial or other limitations.

Due to COVID-19, our galleries are open Thursday and Friday from 12-5 and by appointment only on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Visitors must wear a mask and follow social distancing guidelines.

Please email neal@as220.org to schedule your visit!

Galleries

In light of AS220’s founding mission to provide an unjuried forum for artists, we extend the opportunity to exhibit original creative work in our galleries to every resident of Rhode Island. Each month, artists exhibit new shows in all of our galleries. Public openings are held on the first Saturday of the month.

In 2019, the AS220 Galleries presented 70 exhibits with 129 artists (79 first-time exhibitors!), attended by 2,677 visitors.

Follow the AS220 Galleries on Instagram @as220galleries and Facebook.