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LeftHumerus_1

Artist: Jennifer Steinkamp
Title:
Left Humerus
Date:
  2008
Dimensions:
  size and aspect ratio variable, each wall approximately 13 feet wide x 10 feet high.
Image Credit:
Robert Wedemeyer, courtesy ACME., Los Angeles, greengrassi, London, and Lehmann Maupin, New York.
Exhibition History: 

  1. ACME, Los Angeles, CA, curated by Robert Gunderman and Randy Sommer, May 29 - June 28, 2008.
  2. 2008 Americans for the Arts National Arts Awards, October 6, 2008, New York.
  3. Confines Valencia 09, IVAM, Valencia, Spain, curated by Aaron Betsky,  May 28 - November 15, 2009.

Description:  Oculus Sinister (left eye), was a commission created for the Getty exhibition titled California Video, it utilized volcanic imagery to transform an oculus architectural detail. The installation consisted of video projected into an oculus of the Richard Meier designed building. Oculus translated from Latin means eye; and an oculus detail in architecture refers to an eye of god. I was also inspired by the oculus at the Pantheon in Rome. It was raining the day I visited, it seemed as though the eye was crying. I considered this quite a challenge to create an artwork depicting an eye of god. I first considered the Getty Villa in Malibu being a recreation of the Villa of the Papyri in Herculaneum; this was a library that was covered over with 60 feet of lava in 79 AD when Mount Vesuvius famously erupted destroying Pompeii and the surrounding area. I created pyroclastic imagery, (hot volcanic mud and steam) pouring out of the eye of the oculus. I struggled over what might represent a God's point of view; perhaps it might stretch over time and space; I ended up creating a reference to two millennia and a span half way across the globe between Italy and California.

Movie

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