SHANNON BOOL
*1972, Comox, B.C. / Kanada
Studium an der Städelschule seit 2001, Klasse Prof. Christa Näher
“Crater”
“Meir Wieseltier”
“Mirror / Lamp”
Collage
I like to make pictures with basic materials, sometimes limiting myself to scraps I find in the studio, paper that I rip out from old books I find in flea markets, fabric, tacky wallpaper, coloured construction paper, pencil crayons and glue.
I like to use low design, clichéd images that I find in suburban interior design, handmade store signs, computer clip art and food package design as a starting point for subject matter. When I select this material I find that it is loaded with an unassuming, almost empty significance which emits a cultural background noise that has been three, four or five times removed from its original source. Sometimes I collage a few or several images together or use the computer to make slight alterations. I like to use ornaments for all their redundancy and cheapness—to me they are transparent visual systems that either hook you into a composition like the patterned tiles surrounding a store in a shopping mall, or they can be twisted, ripped and altered to reveal other processes. I like to intervene in exhibition spaces to provide a loophole where different aspects of my work can be negotiated into the space more directly. I try to push an element of kitsch or even magic realism that extends out of my pictures and provides enough of a paradigm shift so that certain preconceived ideas of viewing may be temporarily ruptured, dissociated and lifted.