Pamela Landry
March 25 – April 22, 2006
Opening Reception:
Saturday, March 25 at 8:00 pm
Artist Statement
Electronics and mechanics are of particular interest to me when I create my work. I see technology as raw material and I look for ways to exploit it and make something out of it. By observing the qualities of technology, its malleability and mechanics, I am able to shape my works.
My first pieces incorporated electricity and electronicdevice, transforming everyday objects that are part of the domestic sphere. I dissected these familiar, connotative elements and gave them new functions so that spectators could interact with them. As the public engaged with the work they received additional information. These utilitarian objects and information were part of a questioning and concern with female
identity. For a time, my relation to technology was motivated by a wish to control my means of production, and to construct objects that offered a challenge. It was from this perspective that I created a robot, the archetypal
figure of human technical production. This work contained various references to the representation of the female body, all equally absurd. With the robot and again with Excentriques, a large portion of the exploited associations helped me to make light of an exaggerated female identity.
Now, I am attempting make use of qualities associated with the world of women in a more positive manner, and I am moving away from constructing elements that stem from the assemblage of everyday objects. My recent work uses less irony to criticize a female identity that annoys me and with which I have for a long time made light of the meaning. I call my latest works “machines to stimulate affects”: they require our presence and a more or less intense degree of participation to reveal their full potential. As spectators we are invited to become involved with the machines, taking on the role of either someone who sooths or who is given relief. These new machines make one “feel good” insofar as the purr of a motor or a comforting sound track can create a calming situation.
