Meta-Talk Posters 1-3
The Meta-Talk Posters are a series of three street posted works that address public and private communication. 1998-2001
The dissemination of the works ranges from indiscriminate to site-specific. Consistent with my larger project, each edition pursues a new face for an art that’s unconventionally political; that encourages complexity, possibly transcendence, over moral instruction. Using the vernacular, media and venues of commercial signage, but without the usual reductive strategies, these works display a cautious idealism as they juxtapose public display with intimate reception.
Posted throughout Los Angeles, with an emphasis on the area between East Hollywood and Downtown; additional postings in cities across the country.
Meta-Talk 1
“Let’s Not Fight”
Done in part as a response to the useless discourse in art circles concerning beauty versus thinking, “Let’s Not Fight” adapts a cheerful, positive stance to proclaim “all matter is smart”, and “everything is beautiful”; a sentiment yes, but also consistent with new research in to the mind-body relationship. This project was posted chiefly around art spaces.
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Meta-Talk 2
“Now You Can Talk”
Part of a larger body of work on respect, communication and love, this project insists on a compound identity as an image, a multiple and a tool to connect with others, such as the dead, animals and “folks out of your league”, by communicating across space. “Now You Can Talk” was posted in random and specific areas, including pet parks, cemeteries, and newly trendy neighborhoods.
Meta-Talk 3
“Stabilize Your Hole”
This edition uses exploded images of a worm hole (the speculative union of a black + white hole, enabling time travel) to encourage the viewer to stabilize their own hole. A stable worm hole ensures safe travel, making the message a positive one. The specific placement of the posters yielded other, more compound messages, depending on site, including a bankrupt minimarket, a strip joint, a closed for construction Art Park, and a bad construction make-over. Posted throughout Los Angeles and Philadelphia in 2000.