Cast in Place
Union Studios Project Space
Kansas City, MO
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Union Studios Project Space
Kansas City, MO
Cast-in-place | a manner of constructing buildings where walls and slabs of the buildings are cast at the site in formwork
Through painting, installation, sculpture, collage and photography, I seek to understand and intervene in constructed environments, the history of place, perceptual dynamics and site. These ‘sites’ include found books and images, architectural interiors, building facades, and gallery venues.
The Cast in Place installations began when I was invited to respond to a venue with an irregular footprint and carpeted walls. I found simple ways to influence the space that shifted how I thought about making; stacking and propping materials, integrating structures and furniture I found in the gallery, and responding to the history of the room - carpet rips became edges, stains on the shag walls peeked out from behind framed works, a projector screen became form, door windows created sight lines - giving context to choices I may otherwise make intuitively. I constructed large panels to conceal and recontextualize the carpeted walls, using windows and openings in these planes that brought features into illusionistic and constructed dialogues.
My mother operated an interior painting and wallpapering business for over two decades that reimagined many interiors on the campus where I initially presented Cast In Place. To acknowledge this history, I found it necessary to wallpaper in the gallery to connect ideas of labor and family to this work. This brings personal ideas into my work in new and meaningful ways that can be adapted to changing sites.
The following images are from the second iteration of Cast in Place built in response to a white slate that places elements from the first installation into new relationships. This presentation integrates reoriented forms, architectural fragments mined from a demolition site, and photograph collages depicting surfaces and structures from adjacent urban spaces. This body of work remains an experiment in recursive ways of shaping architecture.
Cast in Place 02, 2022, site-specific installation, latex paint on mdf, plywood, pine and masonite, framed photograph collages, temporary wallpaper, chipboard, found brick fragment, carpet, light; 10.5’ x 16’ x 39’
installation photographs by EG Schempf
Through painting, installation, sculpture, collage and photography, I seek to understand and intervene in constructed environments, the history of place, perceptual dynamics and site. These ‘sites’ include found books and images, architectural interiors, building facades, and gallery venues.
The Cast in Place installations began when I was invited to respond to a venue with an irregular footprint and carpeted walls. I found simple ways to influence the space that shifted how I thought about making; stacking and propping materials, integrating structures and furniture I found in the gallery, and responding to the history of the room - carpet rips became edges, stains on the shag walls peeked out from behind framed works, a projector screen became form, door windows created sight lines - giving context to choices I may otherwise make intuitively. I constructed large panels to conceal and recontextualize the carpeted walls, using windows and openings in these planes that brought features into illusionistic and constructed dialogues.
My mother operated an interior painting and wallpapering business for over two decades that reimagined many interiors on the campus where I initially presented Cast In Place. To acknowledge this history, I found it necessary to wallpaper in the gallery to connect ideas of labor and family to this work. This brings personal ideas into my work in new and meaningful ways that can be adapted to changing sites.
The following images are from the second iteration of Cast in Place built in response to a white slate that places elements from the first installation into new relationships. This presentation integrates reoriented forms, architectural fragments mined from a demolition site, and photograph collages depicting surfaces and structures from adjacent urban spaces. This body of work remains an experiment in recursive ways of shaping architecture.
Cast in Place 02, 2022, site-specific installation, latex paint on mdf, plywood, pine and masonite, framed photograph collages, temporary wallpaper, chipboard, found brick fragment, carpet, light; 10.5’ x 16’ x 39’
installation photographs by EG Schempf
