TBC/MAG

Jenny Kendler’s performative based artwork entitled “Offering” finds its roots planted firmly in the history of environmentally conscious art practices whose luminaries include Ana Mendieta, Alice Aycock, Lita Albuquerque, and Andy Goldsworthy.

Like these artists, Kendler’s interventions into nature are subtle and delicate and derive from a desire to understand our place in the natural world and our responsibility as stewards of the planet. Kendler sets up an alternate reality within the framework of a familiar and manmade natural occurrence, i.e. a hummingbird’s visit to a feeder. Kendler stages her own body as an alternate source of sustenance, having painted her ear a deep and enticing shade of red, and periodically filling her ear canal with sugar water, to attract the birds. 

Kendler’s performance is less about the actual visitations of the birds, circling as they do around the feeder and Kendler’s ear, and much more about the artist’s commitment to her own process, standing still for two hours as the birds navigate the surrounding landscape. The work is a mediation between the human body and nature, an attempt to intersect the natural order of things, not for the sake of disruption, but for the sake of understanding. On the surface, Kendler’s performance appears quiet and simple, yet hers is a quietude that derives from an essential and undeniable longing for a better world, or at the very least a world where human beings are attentive to the beauty that surrounds them. 

Kendler interjects herself into the landscape in much the same way Ana Mendieta allowed that her body was its own verifiable province, alive and flourishing alongside the living world. The interjection is low impact in terms of its actual physicality yet intensely realized in its deeper intentions. For example, in her Silueta Series, Mendieta mediated her naked body with the earth, creating female silhouettes in nature with materials ranging from leaves and twigs to human blood in an attempt to remake herself and repair her sense of displacement, having been sent away from her native Cuba at a young age.

Similarly, Kendler employs her own body as a passive vehicle for contemplation and resistance. The artist’s one red ear becomes not only a vessel whereby the hummingbirds might feed, but also becomes a kind of portal of transmutation. Painting her ear red is both a gesture of regeneration and violence as the ear is a means of feeding the bird yet also appears bloody and disfigured. As viewers, we also associate the human ear with language or the ability to communicate, i.e. to hear and be heard, yet Kendler’s ear obfuscates its own functionality until the ear becomes less literally anatomical and more a symbol of dissonance, a gaping red orifice where language and sound dissolve into sugared water. Whether or not the bird partakes is ultimately not Kendler’s objective. What is more important is the fact the ear is being proffered up as an alternative source of sustenance. 

Kendler’s “offering” also conflates our human senses in that we expect to hear with our ears. Hearing is subverted once she fills her ear with liquid which then transforms the ear into a drinking vessel which then further relates it with the act of eating. The ear is offered up to us as viewers as a kind of sacrificial offering, a point of entry into consciousness, yet this consciousness is subverted whereby the single red ear becomes a talisman for grief and joy simultaneously. Thus, Kendler’s ear transforms yet again into an object of intense fascination. The ear becomes not only a symbol of thwarted communication, but also a symbol for the artist as Mother Earth and shaman, healing the world while also excising personal demons. 

Ultimately, Kendler’s body is transformed into an activated landscape of agency and self-reflection as the ear hears only the small hummingbird feeding beside it; the artist becomes a witness to her own practice as well as to the music inherent in nature. She hears her own breath coupled with that of the bird as the rest of the living world simply falls away. 

What is the effect and intent of making work about the disconnect between humans and their environment? And what is the benefit of creating this work using advanced technologies?

The intent really boils down to encouraging individuals to reconsider how they view themselves within a larger human system and how our system relates to non-human systems. I am interested in creating metaphorical links through objects, allowing us to reconsider ourselves through the greater lens of the natural system we are part of. In reality, humans are a small blip in the timeline of planet earth (as far as we know currently). Using advanced technologies allows me to utilize tools that many of us know well (cell phones for example) or recognize (3D printing) and to use them as material vehicles by which to share these ideas. 

Do you find working with advanced prototyping technologies to be a limitation in exploring natural phenomena?

Evolving technology has always been at the forefront of my artistic, educational and professional career. While I am interested in emergent technologies and systems, it is imperative that my work calls to mind traditional sculptural techniques. For that reason, I rely heavily on the use of wood, plastic, metal and foundry processes, and it is imperative that these materials and methods make themselves evident to the viewer to provide a sense of tangibility. I simply see and approach digital fabrication technologies as a tool and material within my practice, the same way that I approach traditional materials and methods. 

I think there is an assumption that using computer-aided systems will lead work towards a process of quick perfection, which couldn’t be more opposite. For me, working with digital software and tools requires the same type of dedication to skill and technique as working with most other materials. While the computer and computer-aided tools can do amazing things—sometimes quicker than analog processes—they still require a significant amount of time to process, assemble and prototype. I really see my use of these tools as collaborative, and I always have to adjust for the digital tool’s limits. Overall, I find these processes to be freeing rather than limiting. As these tools shift and change, I see an exciting opportunity for my practice and processes to evolve alongside new technologies. 

Where do you see your work going next? 

The title of my next project—Well, Real Estate Is Always Good As Far As I’m Concerned—is a quote from 45 (President Donald Trump) prior to election. This is an in-progress project utilizing a digitally fabricated wood composite city, which is constructed for the consumption / destruction by a colony of live termites. The entire city will be comprised of real estate that has ties to 45. Currently this includes 33 notable locations (the number may change) that I am 3D modeling based on images and information from Google Maps. 

In its planned final form, the city will include small-scale models that reference famous high-rise structures, a university, golf course, skating rink, restaurants and performance centers that all refer back to 45’s real estate portfolio. This project is currently in its infancy, with the 3D models for each real estate structure being created through modeling software. After the buildings are modeled computationally, they will be 3D printed. After they are printed, I will make a mold of each city block and ultimately cast them in a custom wood composite material, allowing for the city to become a habitat and meal for a small colony of termites. 

The city will be contained within its own acrylic dome, with proper considerations for the livelihood of the colony to complete the habitat. The dome is meant to reference the 1998 movie The Truman Show, a satirical science fiction movie where the main character is adopted and raised by a corporation. This character is also trapped inside of a simulated television show, which is intended to reference our current political climate and its rise to arguable popularity / power through network television. The city will be monitored with a live web camera feed to monitor the activity of its inhabitants. 

I am looking for an entomologist to partner with on this project, to ensure the survivability of a termite colony—as well as the long-term hope for consumption of this dystopian city. I have been working on this project consistently for two years, and am somewhat nervous of its reception, but have always been interested in building a city for termites. Given our current political climate, it seems like the right time and opportunity. 

Approximations of History reveals distinct changes in the river’s course that led to this paved over dry-bed, representing the nine hypothesized courses between 1815 and 1938. The work presents a less palatable story of Los Angeles, one in which the life-giving river that had sustained Indigenous peoples for thousands of years prior was violently colonized by settlers who would eventually form  the concrete basin, implanting a system of water scarcity into the heart of young Los Angeles.

The installation, comprised of nine sculptures each referencing a historic course,  falls loosely in line with form of the channelized River. Walnut pedestals are topped with glass encasements, each containing a false fossil: a concrete slab derived from extracting the line of a previous course. Presented in a museological vernacular,  the work questions the histories we have been taught, and the methods used to convey information as absolute and true. 

 Approximations of History is as much political as it is visually striking, questioning  what our culture deems worthy of fossilizing as historical fact. Reckoning with history is necessary context for the severe water shortage we have today. Encased fragments of this waterway atop museum-like wooden podiums are ominous; a foreboding warning of what’s to come once drought becomes too severe and rivers turn to outdated relics.

“ I hope to strike emotional chords with people as they experience the work... creating opportunities to  connect on a deeply personal and emotional level with issues that impact us all ,” said Scacco. “On a grander scale I want to contribute to genuine social and political action. I believe this begins with full access to the truth of our collective history. My work is a social commentary of the many unknown histories that led us to this moment.”

The upcoming Procession, slated for 2021, is a project utilizing mapping as a tool to mobilize historical knowledge, and to create a shared embodied experience. Physically tracing previous river courses mapped onto current day Los Angeles, the day-long event will begin with three groups of local residents traversing previous  routes of the Los Angeles River based on maps of aggregated historical data. The groups will converge in a festival about water and ecology at Los Angeles State Historic Park, located in Los Angeles’ Chinatown, a location where historic river routes intersect. The festival indicates the expansion of Scacco’s practice. Through deep collaboration and engagement, she hopes to create experiences that inspire us to think differently about the river, and to be dedicated stewards of the water and the land in which we live. 

“This is the best way I could think of to collectively experience this history of the river, and to reframe our relationship with the streets we walk on and the environment that we live in,” said Scacco.  “Much of my work is based on knowledge that is generally locked away in archives. I am interested in breaking down the barriers presented by the walls of institutions, and sharing this information as widely and publicly as possible.”

In their own compelling ways, each of these projects documents the phases of man-made disruptions that transformed a natural resource into a concretized dry bed. In this telling, the river’s story becomes emblematic of the short sighted approaches to rapid urbanization of the early twentieth century that are at the heart of the climate crisis.

Scacco’s work comes at an important juncture in the life of the River. As architects, writers, activists, and artists turn their attention to the River and consider ways to bring new infrastructure and visitors to this long-overlooked natural feature of Los Angeles, there is a likely threat that residents in neighborhoods near the river will be pushed out in the name of “revitalization.” Scacco hopes that her work and it’s critical reflection on the River’s long history will contribute to shared knowledge and  local participation efforts so that we do not repeat the same mistakes from the past and create a future that is socially and environmentally viable.