Cosmic House Offers Insight and Renewal
Maggie Tchir and Kathleen Hill have created an extraordinary installation at the Kootenay Gallery in Castlegar. They offer us the opportunity to enter Cosmic House — Point of Return and spend time there in the three rooms of persuasion, consumption and renewal.
The exhibit runs until November 7. Here are some photos of it (all by Jeremy Addington) interspersed with quotes from the artist statement. You can see more on the artists’ blog.
Green Man Portal
Maggie Tchir (Ask the artists a question about the exhibit in the comment section below. They'll answer!)
We have organized COSMIC HOUSE with a main portal and three rooms, each with a threshold/doorway…. The main portal is the welcoming Green Man. With his open mouth he invites us to enter. In earlier pagan and Christian times, the Green Man was seen as the threshold of the imagination between our outer natures and our deepest selves. In the early Christian era he was carved in stone in monasteries and churches throughout Europe. He is seen as the mouthpiece of the inspiration of the Divine Imagination.
Green Man Detail (Handfelted wool on Lutradur)
Kathleen Hill (Ask a question about Cosmic House in the comment section below. She'll answer!)
In the act of diving deeply into the ideas of persuasion and consumption we have often found ourselves overwhelmed. A large part of our journey during the construction of Cosmic House has been taming tsunamis of trash and absorbing the inundation of news and images. Turning to face these aspects of our culture directly has been transformative and has shifted our individual relationships to these ideas in terms of how we are persuaded and how we consume on a daily basis.
Trash tiles detail for Room of Consumption-- Cosmic House
The Room of Renewal and the Green Man bring an offering of contemplation and intention to everyone who enters Cosmic House. We are indeed at a threshold and our actions now are very timely and important. The idea of renewal, restoration and rejuvenation lie at the matrix of all life systems and our renewal on the planet beckons us to take action with wisdom and heart.
Cosmic House – Point of Return is an offering. Through the created spaces and specific objects within, we offer you points of reflection about our communal relationship with our Cosmic House, this biosphere that we call home.
Thanks again for these pics, Bill. Great theme, and great art!
This is such a special exhibit by some very talented locals. I love how these textile artists use their medium as a painter would or as a sculptor can. Tchir and Hill fully explore the boundaries of textiles while creating something beautiful that deals with some of the most important issues facing our society. I love that the exhibit culminates on the concept of renewal. Not all is lost!
From far away (Vancouver) this seems like a timely and ambitious project. I wish I could see more than the tantalizing glimpse of the Room of Consumption detail. Since the piece is experiential/performative -in that the viewer has to participate in order to see it- maybe a walk-through with a video cam would be a useful documentation. Also, I’d like to know more about the materials -what are they, what did they suggest to you, what difficulties or fun did you have using them. Does one walk back out through the mouth?
I know, I’m full of questions! Bravo, b
Loved the show. It exceeded my/our expectations by a mile – thought provoking and also technically extremely accomplished. Hope that it gets to travel beyond the Nelson area.
You’re right, Bettina, a video tour would have been a great idea. It’s the sort of thing we hope to do more of in the future on this site, so you’re invited to keep checking us out….
Hi Bettina,
Yes, it would be nice if you were closer! and yes, to the video cam idea… we did think of this, but life got in the way and we don’t have easy access to one…perhaps before the show comes down this Sunday we shall be able to rectify this!
To answer you questions:
We collected our daily trash, the clean stuff like packaging etc,…. washing it as needed, like tetra packs, and chip bags….everything that came into our homes on a daily basis we put aside to be used. We made ‘trash tiles’ that are collaged from our trash heaps, uniform in size and these tiles were then used as our building blocks for the walls.
The walls of the Room of Consumption and all the outer walls are made from Lutradur, the building material which is used in upholstry and in building….(to keep insulation tightly packed into the walls of a house etc). The Room of Persusian is coverd with canvas and the inner 2 layered walls are silk organza with transfered photo-images. The Room of Renewal is covered with handfelted merino wool. …. The rooms are each eight ft square cubes.
The Green Man’s mouth / entrance /threshold is also the egress back out of the installation. We liked the idea of carnival and cosmic and used this idea in our conception the work. The Room of Consumption is about man-made artifact/artificial while the Room of Persuasion and Room of Renewal use natural fibres from plants (cotton) and silk worms and from sheep, conveying the idea of the natural world. The canvas floor cloth in the Room of Renewal is nature-dyed printed with decaying leaves.
This entire project has been an amazing journey for the past 3 years, attempting to articulate our feelings about renewal in these times of great change. We decided to focus on and investigate the consumptive and persuasive habits of humankind. Our research and explorations have consumed us and the installation, Cosmic House – Point of Return, is our result. We both feel grateful for this time to be able to explore these important issues facing all of us, as well as the challenges of working collaboratively.
Collaboration has been and continues to be a vital and focal part of the entire creative and expressive journey! and one we feel models the importance of working together on the planet to make a difference.
Hope to see you in Vancouver one of these times soon!
Maggie
This is an absolutely exquisite exhibit. I hope you take it on the road! Your use of materials in the room of consumption is amazing, trash delicately handcrafted into visual delight. The room of renewal I found so touching, a place to make an offering to the Earth, from the heart. Such a gorgeous, thoughtful, timely (and hopeful) exhibit. Thank you Maggie and Kathleen.
Hello, Kathleen,
This looks like a wonderful exhibit, one that I wish I could see in person. An enormous amount of engagement and work, but obviously very satisfying and exciting at the same time. Thanks for telling me about the site, Kathleen. Perhaps we’ll meet again in North Hatley – or in the Kootenays – at some time in the future.
I meant to check for Deborah Forbes’ site before I sent this, but here is her name again, in case you are interested and can find a link.
Judy
P.S. Not for publication, just a note to you.