Joe Davidson
Pig Pile
2020

About the Item

Joe Davidson’s recent body of work consists of interlocking forms stacked one on top of another. Upon closer inspection, one can see the remnants of the sources. Davidson casts the forms in tinted plaster using balloons as his molds. He is drawn towards familiar objects and associations that are embedded within them. His work recognizes the force of gravity, sometimes tacitly and sometimes overtly. It is a practice of mixing the delicate with the ordinary, relishing the materiality while also attempting to address the ephemeral. It is that steady push and pull between mass and lightness, solidity and absence, form and void that defines his work. STATEMENT In the end, gravity always wins. It is the blunt, immutable force that has a constant effect, keeping us on the ground and ultimately pulling us into it. Sculpture by its very nature is in conversation with this pull, at times enjoying and acknowledging it, and at times trying to hide and defy it. My work recognizes the force of gravity, sometimes tacitly and sometimes overtly. It is a practice of mixing the delicate with the ordinary. I have been mining the contrasts of sculpture, relishing the materiality while also attempting to address the ephemeral. Because sculpture is so heavily rooted in the ground, one has to accept its materiality. Yet, some of the most effective work I have witnessed is that which attempts transcendence. It is that steady push and pull between mass and lightness, solidity and absence, form and void. Additionally, I am drawn towards familiar objects and associations that are embedded within them. Current work makes reference to visual anchors such as bodily forms, sagging, or bloating. Whether the product is a still life created in Scotch tape or a bouquet composed of plaster flowers, I look to the fantastic as a goal in my work. The work is intensely representational in content but without clearly assigned meaning, thus creating a disquiet. In this way I think in a surrealist vein, looking to traditional figures like Eva Hesse and Piero Manzoni, and contemporary figures like Robert Gober and Matthew Barney. The juxtaposition of the seemingly simple streamline objects with this disquiet adds a powerful force to the work, again symbolic of the contrast between the emotional life which defines us as humans and the compulsions and minutia that compose our daily lives. Joe Davidson

Creator:

Joe Davidson

Creation Year:

2020

Dimensions:

Height: 18 in (45.72 cm)Width: 14 in (35.56 cm)Depth: 14 in (35.56 cm)

Medium:

Plaster,ABS

Movement & Style:

Abstract

Period:

2010-