ann morton

  • HOME
  • PORTFOLIO
    • It's Only Natural
    • Proof Reading
    • NOT
    • We Call This Home
    • ReThanks
    • Warning Signals
    • What Happened Today?
    • Josef and Michelle
    • Ground Cover
    • INFLUX - Cycles 3 and 5
    • Street Gems
    • Samplers
    • Crime Scenes
    • Hear I Am
    • Caution Field
    • Collective Cover Project >
      • Collective Processing Sequence
      • Collective Members
      • From the Collective
    • 13 Fridays
    • By a Thin Thread
  • STATEMENT/BIO
  • NEW WORK
  • CURRENTS
  • CONTACT
  • HOME
  • PORTFOLIO
    • It's Only Natural
    • Proof Reading
    • NOT
    • We Call This Home
    • ReThanks
    • Warning Signals
    • What Happened Today?
    • Josef and Michelle
    • Ground Cover
    • INFLUX - Cycles 3 and 5
    • Street Gems
    • Samplers
    • Crime Scenes
    • Hear I Am
    • Caution Field
    • Collective Cover Project >
      • Collective Processing Sequence
      • Collective Members
      • From the Collective
    • 13 Fridays
    • By a Thin Thread
  • STATEMENT/BIO
  • NEW WORK
  • CURRENTS
  • CONTACT

When I'm 64 - culminating a healing summer

10/6/2018

0 Comments

 
When I'm 64 - Exhibited in 10 Artists-2000 Speculums in Step Gallery at ASU's Grant Studios in downtown Phoenix. October 5th - 12th 2018
Picture
0 Comments

"Vagina Scrunchie" featured on show invitations

10/6/2018

0 Comments

 
Early in the process, the curator, Lauren O'Connell asked for some progress shots. Still awaiting my final yarns to be delivered, I made several tests and this little scrunchie, when used to suspend the speculum looked very much like, well, a vagina. That was when I knew how I would approach this piece.
Picture
0 Comments

A summer of recovery and work - "When I'm 64" a healing journey

10/6/2018

0 Comments

 
When I explored my solution for a piece for the show 10 Artists-2000 Speculums, it seemed simple enough. But as I accomplished my tests and settled on how the final components would work, I started doing the math and realized that I would have to make at least 3 components per day to finish in time for the opening of this exhibition - each component taking about 1 1/2 - 2 hours to complete. That was in July and the install for the show was on September 30th! It's a good thing that for much of the summer, all I could do is heal from a surgery that was ultimately reflected in this personal work. You see, the show revolves around the speculum - a diagnostic tool that all women have experienced during vaginal exams. My surgery? - a hysterectomy. It's a loss of such a vital part of a woman's body. I am fortunate that I was asked to develop work around this familiar, but fearful object. Through this intense work, I was able to process my procedure in such a meaningful and personal expression.
Picture
0 Comments

Modified's Miguel Monzon Produces a Short Video About "It's Only Natural"

5/10/2018

0 Comments

 
Our friend Miguel Monzon and Assistant Gallery Manager at Modified Arts produced a short preview of some of the work installed for the It's Only Natural Exhibition. 

Click Here
Picture
0 Comments

Conflating Real Experiences with Current Events – and the Work!

5/10/2018

0 Comments

 
Having been easily moved by random events that occurred on our road trips – added to the constant overlay of broader events affecting our world - each work in this collection reflects an actual random experience from our travels. But I can’t seem to help myself from conflating these personal events with the current issues of our time.
 
And so, combined with the collection of physical findings, random happenings from our time on the road, and my gravitation toward the political, the result is this work that is at once intimately personal, while offering broader social commentary.
Picture
IMPACT
On the roads of Cape Brenton in Nova Scotia, night was falling. More than once, an owl would swoop out of the forest and fly across the road, illuminated by our headlights. Suddenly there was a loud impact on our windshield. We knew one of those owls had hit us. It left an uneasy feeling as we drove on through the night. Later, in August, in Oregon, we were driving to experience the total eclipse and saw a large mound of feathers on the side of the road. We stopped and discovered an owl, the victim of the same kind of impact we had experienced two months earlier in Nova Scotia. We took a few feathers from this magnificent creature. This piece spans those two locations, and commemorates these events. It is a way to communicate my awareness of our own footprint as we venture into the natural world, and also a way to convey that visceral reaction at the moment of impact.  
Picture
FIRE
There were 8 forest fires raging in New Mexico during our time there. At times, we had feared our camp spots might be overwhelmed with smoke. We had decided to drive up an ancient caldera and around the rim only to find out that the southern route was blocked by fires. So we headed up through Los Alamos, the birthplace of the Atomic Bomb, to take a northern route, Forest Road 144. A spectacular drive, we could see the live fire across the caldera, but we also drove through areas devastated by past fires. “Fire” relates this drive, and uses a piece of charred wood found here. It also combines a carved hand grenade (purchased at a roadside curio shop), New Mexican churro wool, and red chili peppers from Chimayo. Paired with “Ice”, the two works speak to the dangerous precipice on which we find ourselves - the brink of nuclear conflict, or the potential devastation caused by climate change.
Picture
​WHITE LIES
We were visiting the White Sands National Monument and somehow, I didn’t think twice about putting some of the sand in a bag for a future work. I also found some white plastic netting and I was struck by the aesthetic of the white on white effect of the netting embedded in the sand. Later, while collecting some dry grasses, I was confronted by two rangers who drove up to ask what I was doing. Needless to say, my collection was not allowed, and upon further search, they found my bag of sand too. I’m ashamed of my reaction to the rangers, because I told a few “white lies” in this exchange. I lost the sand and I got a $200.00 fine. I made “White Lies” to relate this very real incident, but it also speaks to the idea of white privilege and how it holds no substance. What might this have to say about our broader social condition in today’s world?
0 Comments

Road Trip Experiences Inspire Joint Exhibition

5/10/2018

0 Comments

 
For the first time, my husband Bill Timmerman (who is a  photographer), and myself orchestrated a show together. The show visually relates specific findings from our summer travels in 2017. Bill looks for ties between the built and unbuilt world, while I employ the serendipity of found objects and random experiences – brought together to convey new messages. 

Below is featured some of my work from the show along with its accompanying story and images from the road.
Picture
CATCHING TIME
We underestimated the time it would take us to drive the Cape Brenton loop on the northeastern end of Nova Scotia. As night fell, we realized that if we kept driving, we would miss the magnificent views and landscape in the dark. So, with some trepidation on my part, we pulled just off the road at a viewpoint widening and decided to spend the night in the car. We carefully positioned the vehicle so that in the morning, our view would be down a vast valley, on out to the sea. It was a bit scary, but we were left undisturbed. Back on our way the next morning, we stopped at a beach where there were thousands of sea-smoothed stones stacked in cairns everywhere as far as we could see. It was as if we were receiving confirmation of our decision to stop and let time pass, so that we would not miss such a sight as this field of cairns. How often must we remind ourselves to stop, and catch time?
Picture
Picture
Picture
0 Comments

The NOT show is included in New Times Best Trump Art We Saw in Phoenix in 2017!

12/14/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
On December 13, 2017, several images from the NOT show were included in Lynn Trimble's article for the New Times featuring valley artists who offer commentary about the current Trump administration in their work.

http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/slideshow/the-best-trump-art-we-saw-in-phoenix-in-2017-9938634/2
0 Comments

"NOT" Exhibited at phICA's Onloaded Container Galleries

12/3/2017

0 Comments

 
​The work in this exhibition is my personal attempt to translate the turmoil that I, and many in this country feel. We’ve been stripped, twisted, wound up tight, and tied into knots over what we are hearing and experiencing on a daily basis with the Trump White House.
 
Using Trump "Make America Great Again" campaign t-shirts that have been cut into strips, those long pieces were tightly twisted to create rope, and then tied into a series of knots. Each knot carriers a title and description based on its real-life name and purpose – but has been reinterpreted to reference the barrage of stunning headlines emanating from the Trump administrations’ antics and careless policies.

On the back of each knot plaque is a print of the real-life headline that inspires the use of its corresponding NOT knot.

phICA's Onloaded 5 Container Galleries
Sheep Shank Man O' War - (shortens the length of our rope)
Slippery Gang-of-8 Loop - (supposed to make an adjustable opening)
Half-Hearted Hitch - (basic over(under)hand knot)
Monkey-See-Monkey-Do Fist Knot - (ball-shaped knot for decoration with no function)
Oval Office Slip Noose - (self-tightening rope when weight and momentum are applied)
Doubtful-Double Fisherman - (could bring two ends together)
Isolationist Loop - (isolates an unwanted section of our rope)
Undocumented Constrictor Knot - (ties up loose items)
VP Backup Knot - (provides security to the primary knot)
Feel-Like-Heaving Line Knot - (adds weight and gravity to the end of our rope)
Icicles-Are-Melting Hitch - (desperately holds onto diminishing objects)
Twitter Double-Down Loop - (easily tied, difficult to undo)
1300 Nots - an unlucky meditation
1300 Nots - close up
Overall installation
(All photos by Bill Timmerman)
​© 2017, Ann Morton

0 Comments

ReThanks Featured in American Craft Magazine online

10/5/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
The ReThanks project is featured by Associate Editor Robert O'Connell in a follow-up article in the September 12, 2017 issue of American Craft Magazine online.

https://craftcouncil.org/post/ann-mortons-treasured-trash 
0 Comments

KJZZ Features City Hall Exhibition in On-air Interview

3/9/2017

0 Comments

 
Local NPR afifliate, KJZZ spoke with Ann Morton and Christina Park about the 27th Ave. Public Arts Residency exhibition on display at the Phoenix City Hall. Follow this link to hear the interview featuring work by both Morton and Christine Lee.

http://kjzz.org/content/446445/art-pieces-recyclables-display-phoenix-city-hall
0 Comments
<<Previous

    New Work in Progress

    This is an ongoing narrative that follows new projects in progress.

    Archives

    October 2018
    May 2018
    December 2017
    October 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    December 2016
    August 2016
    June 2016

    Categories

    All
    10 Artists/2000 Speculums
    27th Ave. Dump
    American Craft Magazine
    Arizona Science Center
    Art
    AZ NPR
    Catching Time
    Charred Wood
    Chimayo Red Chili
    Churro Wool Felt
    City Of Phoenix
    Community Participation
    Drilled Stone
    Dump
    Exhibition
    Final Push
    Fire
    Flower Makers
    Flowers
    Found Objects
    Hand Grenade
    Impact
    It's Only Natural
    KJZZ
    Knots
    Netting
    New Times
    NOT
    Owl Feathers
    PhICA Container Galleries
    #phxart27dump
    Public Art
    Public Art Residency
    Radio Interview
    Recyclables
    Re-Thanks
    Re-Thanks Installation
    ReThanks Opening
    Ride Along
    Rope
    Speculum
    Spike
    Step Gallery
    Trash
    Trash Pick Up
    Trump
    Trump Art
    Trump T-shirts
    Volunteers
    Warning Signals
    When I'm 64
    White Lies
    White Sands
    Workshops

    RSS Feed

Copyright © Ann Morton, 2017, 2018