Tim Hawkinson
He is extremely conscious of how his pieces will have an auditory and visual effect on the viewer. He problem solves to create a mechanism that produces sounds of musical instruments without using complex electronics and without having prior formal engineering knowledge. The pieces evolve as he creates them throughout this problem solving process. For instance, his initial plan for the water droplets was completely abstract- he liked the sound of water droplets. As they dropped he could hear how he could produce recognizable, nonrandom rhythm involving these water droplets. From there he created a structure that encapsulates the viewer/listener and brings them to an enchanted, Dr. Seuss-esque scene of twisted, knotted plastic wrap and the flow of water. He enriches all of the senses at once.
Sarah Sze
Sarah took pride in and felt strongly connected to the building process of her piece for the highline in NYC. Often she would use a material or some kind of scaffolding originally intending for it to be taken out of the final piece but would be flexible as she had newfound connections to those materials. She was very excited to be able to alter the meaning/physicality of the piece as something new arrives. She felt as though her pieces moved through space due to this quality; it may both be fleeting and permanent, she may never know, but it fluctuates. This added to the meaning of many of her pieces that involved spaces that have been transformed in the past- such as the highline, post shutdown- and yet they still stand with beauty.
Pepon Osorio
His use of very personal memories in his art allows for self-reflection and the opportunity to learn about himself, but also pulls the audience in with a personal, empathetic connection. This makes the audience vulnerable opening them up to be more accepting of messages of the need for change in his work. He tries to produce a clear mission and understands how to use the displacement of familiar objects and scenes to portray his vision. For instance, he used bright happy, colors and familiar, childhood objects in a room with a large video projected on the wall of a son telling a father how the father’s prison sentence negatively affected him. His work his jarring but very clear due to his intentional use of materials, color and space.
