Impermanence
Impermanence is the result of an almost three year exploration of the devastation caused by the fire that ravished Kendall Messick’s home in 2006. In nearly 200 images of the scene he has oscillated between his typical portrait and documentary practice and a more aestheticized pictorization to create photographs that are metonymic and act as a space of meditation and scrutiny. Many of these images are reminiscent of Aaron Siskind’s metaphoric abstract photographs from the 1960s that portray dripping paint, graffiti and peeling walls. However, unlike Siskind, Messick does not wish to impart a transcendent sensibility but instead, he calls attention to details and privileges a particular type of note taking. One sees in the development of such images, rendered over a period of one year, the artist’s attempt to assess the damage. Messick indicates that in the weeks after the fire, he spent much of his time itemizing his loss for insurance purposes. His abstract images convey a similar type of enumeration, not only of specific objects but also of the space that housed these objects. These images are simultaneously emotive and analytic, their visual impact owed to their composition. Messick’s use of a square format causes the image to be pushed out towards the edges of the pictorial field leaving no room for additional narrative. This, coupled with their diminutive size as compared to other works in the series, afford them a specimen-like quality.
As part of this body of work Messick has also produced surreal images that bring the viewer closer to the facts of the fire. In drawing us nearer, the more concentrated looking that is demanded by the abstract pictures gives way to a visual pulling back, suggesting the palpable weight of Messick’s reaction to the disaster. The artist’s method of managing the constant unfolding of ruin is to translate it into a series of vignettes that reveal more of the destroyed space. In contrast to the abstract pictures, these works recall film stills and are sharply photographed with acerbic color that calls Mannerist painting to mind. In them, charred corridors lead to rooms filled with scorched and mangled objects. In one, an open door reveals disembodied heads bathed in a ethereal light while in another, dripping streaks stain eerie blue walls. These elements make them enigmatic as their seemingly constructed nature belies the actuality of the event. One is caused to wonder how these heads came to be in this room, in this way? What is Messick trying to articulate as he invites the viewer to move with him down lonely corridors? The probing, almost forensic nature of some of his images suggests that Messick is also searching for the answers to such queries.
In Corapeake (1995) and The Projectionist (2007), two portrait-based projects that seek to record the passing of communities and the transience of life, Messick embedded himself in the ever-changing lives of his subjects in order to record the tenor of each passing day. These works contain a biographical element as Messick has always been drawn to such narratives. At first glance Impermanence appears to be a departure from such ruminations, however it is arguably the most intimate of his photo essays and is the first time he has turned his camera onto himself so extensively. In a series of pictures of objects entitled Conflagrations he recalls his portraitist and biographical devices to examine the fire’s aftermath. His likeness can be found in these objects, as they are beloved possessions that for the artist resurrect lost craftsmanship. His penchant for reclaiming the past may account for their fetishist treatment in his images. Portraits of head forms once used by haberdashers, fishing gigs traditionally forged by blacksmiths and Steuben glass vases cloaked in the fire’s residue become otherworldly, seeming to materialize as transient things. It is this space of interstitiality that reveals the photo-essay’s redemptive meaning. The images reflect Messick’s sense of wonder in the rediscovery of his objects. His goal in rendering them is to highlight the distinctiveness of change—to move from a universal discourse about the destruction to a more personal celebration of transformation.
A conflagration is an all-consuming fire typically started by human intervention. The heat from such a fire can be so intense that it creates a flow of oxygen, which allows it to feed on itself. Angel, a workman who while using solvent to strip varnish from a room’s wooden detailing, inadvertently struck his steal wool pad against a metal surface starting Messick’s conflagration. In the exhibition, Angel’s image appears in a set of black and white prints, some of which were taken just hours after Messick arrived on the scene. The color reality that describes the conflagration and predominates Messick’s other pictures is transformed in these images to indicate a change in the artist’s mood. Messick often uses this tonal variation to affect an emotional shift. Capitalizing on their warm tones, the photographer seems to be offering up a requiem by locating the images in a room that contains the last evidentiary remnants of the fire. Here, the site as artifact emphasizes the magnitude of the disaster presenting the fire as both historic and contemporary events.
Andrea Douglas
Curator of Exhibitions
University of Virginia Art Museum
Kendall Messick is an artist who constructs installations of still photography, film, video and an ever-evolving assemblage of two and three-dimensional media to capture stories that would otherwise go unheard. From the recollections of elderly townspeople in a crossroads community in rural North Carolina (Corapeake) to a man who has dedicated his life to pursuing his dream of owning a movie palace in the most unconventional way (The Projectionist), Messick is drawn to the stories of aging individuals often overlooked today. According to Messick, “Each exhibition is intended to transcend the documentary chronicling of human experience culminating in a reflection on larger themes of acceptance, intimacy, the nature of memory, and the historical significance of individuals typically passed by. In this work, I seek to reveal universal truths that surface through the personal experiences of the individual.”
Having studied at the International Center of Photography and the School of Visual Arts in New York City, Messick was the still photographer for the acclaimed documentary video There is No Such Word as Can’t sponsored by the Enterprise Corporation of the Delta (1998). During the winter of 1999 he worked in Eastern Europe as the associate producer and still photographer for Here and Now a documentary film on the Gypsies of Bulgaria. Corapeake was Messick’s first documentary film as director and was completed in 2001. After winning film festival awards, Corapeake was a featured broadcast on several PBS affiliates throughout the country. The film was then named a United States preselection finalist for INPUT 2003, which showcases the best of public television programming from around the world. The success of the Corapeake documentary led Messick to create an installation of still photography from the film in 2002. The Corapeake exhibition is currently scheduled to travel to galleries and museums through 2010. The Projectionist is Messick’s second film and exhibition, which was launched in 2007. This project has already garnered both critical and curatorial acclaim, and will be published in book form by Princeton Architectural Press in the fall of 2010. Additionally, The Projectionist exhibition is currently scheduled to travel to institutions through 2010. Messick’s current work in progress is Impermanence. This project has been inspired by a devastating fire that ravaged his home and studio in 2006. Messick’s photographs are in numerous public and private collections including the Smithsonian Institution and the Museum of Modern Art.
