Solo Show of recent work at Montgomery Ward Gallery, UIC Student Center East, 750 S. Halsted Street, UIC.
January 10 - February 10, 2011
Opening Reception: Wednesday, January 19, 4-7p
Realize4 (detail) 24" x 24" glass, gold, grout, paint on wood :: Heather Hancock 2010
In my work, I re-imagine an ancient medium with traditionally decorative and functional uses as a vehicle for exploring contemporary concepts of cognition, language and social identity. My work asserts the essential meaningfulness of glass as a medium. Glass serves literally as a lens to transmit and focus light, and metaphorically as a channel through which something can be seen or understood.
I use the highly physical and permanent media of glass and grout to explore the ephemeral cognitive experience of attending, perceiving, and comprehending. There are direct links between my material process, creating images from glass fragments, and my meta-cognitive inquiry into the emergence of a unified self from innumerable synaptic connections. The interaction between the media of glass and grout and the intangible medium of light further underscores the significance of both material and immaterial dimensions. Light parallels the transience of a cognitive moment and ensures the dynamic nature of the work across space and time. The permanent is thereby animated by changes in lighting conditions and viewers’ perspectives.
Taken together, the 20 works from three series hanging at the Montgomery Ward Gallery address the constructive process of the cognitive moment. A unified experience or self is constructed from incoherent fragments of sensations and memories. Focused attention forms the basis of our conscious experience and allows us to achieve narrative coherence.
Realize5 (detail) 24" x 24" glass, gold, grout, paint on wood :: Heather Hancock 2010