Ring My Bell
96″ x 28″ x 8″
Cast iron, steel hardware
2018
2018 Hot Metal Artist
Artist Statement
My work responds to its site. As a native New Yorker, I spend a great deal of time responding to the perpetual state of change in the city. The open pit of the construction site is not unlike a body turned inside out, its internal systems exposed. To see the infrastructure of the body or a building is to bear witness to support systems and networks that intend holistic, efficient function. My interest in infrastructure and support also comes in part from my own chronic illness, an autoimmune disease that affects both my digestion and joint function, and from my struggle to recognize what my body needs from day to day in order to maintain health.
In addition to responding to site, my work leans on labor-intensive processes and material agency in order to situate itself in relationship to questions of control, (in)stability and queerness. I employ modular construction techniques and complex mold-making in order to create a logic of expansion and contraction — endless, collapsible forms that could be created over and over again. Whether through objects made as game pieces, set sculptures used as dance props, or furniture and architectural elements, I aim to create works that are activated in a variety of ways by the individuals tasked with their interaction. Through these repetitive methods and manipulatable forms, I seek to address touch and support — objects and materials that act as intermediaries between our human bodies and the world outside our skin and elicit the back and forth relationship of an interstitial space between body and auxiliary.
Saar Shemesh
Born: New York, NY, 1991
Resides: New York, NY, USA
Education
BFA, The Cooper Union, 2016