1.04.2014

Obsessive (and Introspective) Art: Simon Evans

Everything I Have, 2008



Found this posted on the Radiolab blog recently and I flashed back to seeing the original, in person, in Chelsea sometime when I was in college... probably in 2008. It must have been at James Cohan Gallery, which the internet tells me represents Evans in New York.

Home Country, 2008-9


I don't remember if Evans had other pieces hanging at the time, which probably means he didn't because upon looking at all his work, it is CRAZY up my alley. I remember LOVING Everything I Own, perhaps partly because I was feeling material-possessions-poor at time, having had to throw away three boxes of clothes, bags and shoes that had gone moldy in a friend's basement while I was abroad in Argentina.

Dear Diary, 2008


But it was those last two years of college that I really figured out exactly what was up my alley, and then proceeded to try and make art like that and found out that I might not be obsessive enough, introspective enough, or some combination of the two. While there are definitely other types of art that I am drawn to, the following is list of characteristics of art that I will almost 100% guaranteed love:
  • a catalogue of things
  • map-based (real, imaginary, edited, etc.)
  • introspective text
  • patterns based on an external system of composition
  • obsessive repetition
  • diagrams
Maybe Simon Evans was the beginning of this for me.

One Hundred Mix CDs for New York, 2008


(via Radiolab, images via James Cohan Gallery)

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