SAVANNAH, GA.- The exhibition Rorschach (Accidental IV) takes place as part of SCAD deFINE ART 2016, the seventh annual program of fine art exhibitions, lectures, performances and public events organized by Savannah College of Art and at
SCAD locations in Atlanta and Savannah, Georgia and Hong Kong.
Rorschach (Accidental IV) is an installation of 70 pieces of flattened antique silver, seeming to levitate just above the gallery floor by Cornelia Parker. Early in her career, the British sculptor avoided the familiar associations of representational objects by creating purely abstract works. In the Rorschach series Parker reverses the process and achieves abstraction by removing recognizable items from their fundamental usage or meanings. Rorschach was inspired by Hermann Rorschach, a Swiss psychiatrist who developed a technique of psychoanalysis utilizing inkblots. Ink is placed onto a piece of paper, folded in half, and when opened produces a symmetrical pattern. Rorschach prompted his subjects to make mental associations based on the ink designs, and these were interpreted as direct projections of the subconscious.
In Rorschach (Accidental IV), the silver objects act as substitutes for the inkblots in the original test, and literally mirror the viewers reflection. As in all of her works with found objects, individual pieces with varying pasts have shared the same fate in the artists hands. Transformed by their lack of dimensionality and suspended a few inches above the gallery floor, the objects and their shadows become cartoon images of their former selves. This exhibition is curated by Alexandra Sachs, executive director of SCAD FASH and Atlanta exhibitions.