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Topographies: A Look At Contemporary Visual Art in California

by Karen Moss

topography
1) the art or practice of graphic delineation in detail of natural and man-made features of a place or region especially in a way to their relative positions and elevation
2) the physical or natural features of an object or entity and their structural relationships

In these traditional definitions from Webster's Dictionary the word "topography" refers to the creation of a metaphorical equivalent in words of a specific, physical landscape. Most often the meaning of topography refers to the representation of a landscape according to some conventional signs or systems of mapping (ie: a topographic map.) With the permutation of language and its shifting significance prevalent in post-modern thought of recent years, the idea of topography as a singular, fixed entity has blurred into a realm of multi-valent meanings of many topographies. The more limited definition of topography used by cartographers and geographers may now be found in diverse contexts ranging from art and architecture to medicine and metallurgy, or realms of science and technology. The very concept of a singular definition of topography, therefore, has evolved into multiple spatial configurations and broken through boundaries of discrete disciplines.

This exhibition will present artists who work with the ideas about different topographies or whose subject can be considered under the general rubric of the "topographical." Less about the traditional genres of landscape or cityscape, their representations are about specific localities and/or senses of place. Including both natural and man-made subjects, the rural and the urban, some topographical works refer to a location in "real" space, while others are fictional. Traversing across definitions and disciplines and media, artists are using divergent materials and media to represent their various topographies, which range from the literal to the conceptual. The artists all share an interest in some kind of mapping, marking, siting, place-making, and an obsession with the aesthetics of surface or space, which are often rendered in abstract, constructed, imagined, invented, or even "hyperreal."

Their work ranges from more traditional and physical topographies related to geography or cartography, to topographical mappings of cultural, social/psychological spaces. Some are tangible and grounded in a precise location or space, while others are fantasized, imagined or projected. Temporally, these topographical expressions are memories of the things past, firmly anchored in the present, or looking toward the future; the artists use time and space to construct meaning for their own respective topographies.

Ultimately, the group of artists in this exhibition all make visual representation of an observed, occupied or invented place, however, they are less interested in describing and more concerned with the idea of delineating or demarcating. Many are more influenced by the strategies of conceptual art of the 1960s and 1970s than they are by more traditional modes that represent the landscape or the environment. And, because they are from California, the idea of "shifting" in aesthetics, space, language, and in the "terra firma" itself are prevalent.
However, rather than revisiting the polemical and often parochial stereotypes of the differences between art from Northern and Southern California that prevailed in the 1950s-1960s, this exhibition attempts to understand the diversity of these artistic sensibilities in a new context-the way some 21st century California artists use the subject of topography to explore the delicate balance between nature and culture. And, since California has the largest, most diverse populations of any state and is one of the richest examples of varied topographies and geo-morphologies, the exhibition will show how some artists are interested in the physical or social aspects of the urban environment, while other prefer to explore nature outside the city.

Given the aspects of our demographics and our terrain, an additional objective to the exhibition and the site-specific projects is to examine how the artists explore current environmental and cultural issues. For instance, as industry, technology and urban sprawl continue to encroach upon the landscape is there a related increase in an artist's desire to describe, reconstruct or mark a specific location in nature, the built environment or a social space? Is there a need for artists to reclaim or re-imagine a particular place because of its potential metamorphosis, or complete loss, through environmental threat? How do the changing notions of topography in our increasingly technological and digitized world affect artists' relationship to place? Does this increase artists' interest in the more tangible, physical properties of a given topography, or, conversely, does this inspire imagined or virtual topographies? Is a particular artists' tendency towards the topographical, more personal, related to their own corporeal presence? Is it perceptual, do they observe or represent the phenomenology of a place? Or, is it purely aesthetic, an engagement with the history of of art, architecture or another aspect of visual culture?

While at this point the Topographies exhibition may elicit more questions than it answers, the final fruition of the exhibition and its related site specific projects, publication, web-site and public programs will provide different avenues for understanding the multiple meanings of the topographic, with a potential impact on audiences not only at the Art Institute and in San Francisco, but throughout the state of California and far beyond.

The Topographies exhibition will be on view in the Walter and McBean Galleries at the San Francisco Art Institute from March 18 - May 10, 2004.