mor(t)ality

this is a project that I completed and installed for an exhibition group show set up by Alex Conner in the New Brunswick Train Station. Here is a copy of the article in the Star Ledger on it.
Conner’s concept for the show, which was called “Art in the Medium of Cardboard and Photocopy- New Brunswick’s Past and Present”- here is a clip of what he wrote about the show: “With the erratic influx of industry back into the city over the past twenty-five years, one can see the identities of economic prosperity and economic disparity coexisting in the streets of New Brunswick every day. The cardboard boxes used to bring in financial files for local banking headquarters are discarded with the trash and serve as bedding and shelter for some of the city's homeless. Thousands of photocopied documents created exclusively for and by local industry are read and then thrown away by all members of the community. Whether the document pertains to a managerial memo or a New Brunswick Police Bulletin, this creation and destruction of information everyday cheapens the message transmitted therein, and creates a sense of disillusionment with the medium of photocopy."

My piece was 2 almost-life-size cardboard people- one of them a man, sitting against the wall, his elbows on his knees, looking down (supposedly a homeless person, though that isn’t really specific exactly and it doesn’t really matter). The other, standing in front of the sitting man, facing away, is a businessman, with a briefcase in one hand, talking on a cell phone. (see pictures)

The name sort of came to me randomly but I liked it a lot- how a cardboard box is used to carry ‘”important” documents to the businessman, thrown away, used as a bed or blanket for a homeless person- the cardboard being treated as unimportant by the business man when really it is a valuable material. Similarly, there are people in a society that are discarded as useless and unimportant, when that is not the case. Further, both people are made out of the same disposable material- despite that they may be different shapes and stand differently, we are all disposable and our lifetimes are limited. and maybe if this mortality was more widely recognized, people might act a little different towards each other. If we realized that being businessman in a big corporation doesn’t make you better or more important- and that these businesses are man-made, of inflated importance, and in the long run a ridiculous waste of time and resources, then morality would be treated differently as well.