Materials check-in: What worked, what didn’t

About Genevieve

The patina of time that covers the world in meaning; this is the currency in which Genevieve Hastings deals. Genevieve's mission as an artist is to evoke and render sensual the relation between time and narrative--between history and meaning. Objects are collected, some from the artists history--a recording of her grandmother singing old Appalachian songs, a photograph of a circus elephant from her time traveling with a Thai circus--some antiques--obsolete and forgotten medical devises smudged with fingerprints and rust--and some new--a video loop of open heart surgery in which the seafoam-gloved hands of an unseen surgeon pilots a scalpel through a wine-dark wake of blood. These are then obfuscated inside a moldering suitcase for instance, or behind a distorting lens beneath a keyhole at the bottom of a steamer, or detectable only as a sound or smell. The viewer must participate with the piece, kneeling, stooping, placing her ear to the side of a cabinet and most of all providing a narrative--how are these objects related? What is the story?