Location of Things

What if things only exist insofar they are visible? Isn’t it possible – to extend Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle – that what we are unable to observe (for lack of refracted light or otherwise) doesn’t exist at all? Located in an anonymous storefront space along an underground passageway beneath Chicago’s Cultural Center, The Location of Things explores our visual cognition – how and whether we “know” something exists. Working alongside former drawing students, we borrowed from the architectural vernacular of our surroundings, recreating at full scale a nearby stairwell that connects the underground with the street level. Studying the stairwell through Rhinoceros, a digital modeling program, we selectively eliminated those visual aspects of the stairwell that were in shadow, leaving only the illuminated parts. These, we created using white photo backdrop paper, which we suspended with monofilament in the room we’d painted black.