LCV Winter 2013-14 - (Page 56)

ee Deigaard is one of the most versatile and dynamic artists working in New Orleans today. Her art seamlessly moves through photography, video, sculpture, installation, drawing and painting. On January 16, 2014, Lee Deigaard: Trespass will open at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. The exhibition will feature photographs from Deigaard's Unbidden series, as well as her video installation Pulse. Trespass is part of Deigaard's continuing exploration into the complex relationship between man and nature. I first became aware of Lee Deigaard's art in 2003, while living in New York City. It was through an article in Time Out New York magazine about a Louisiana artist who had just won an international art competition to create a memorial for an elephant named Topsy at the Coney Island Museum in Brooklyn. The Louisiana artist was Lee Deigaard. A Coney Island sideshow elephant, Topsy had killed three of her trainers, one of whom had fed her a lit cigarette. Topsy was electrocuted to death in 1903 at Luna Park in Coney Island before a cheering crowd of 1,500 people. Thomas Edison made a short film of the event, titled "Electrocuting an Elephant," that documented Topsy's execution as a way to promote two of his most recent enterprises-electric power and the motion picture camera. Lee Deigaard's Memorial to Topsy consists mainly of a Mutoscope, a turn-of-the-century arcade device used for peep shows. Deigaard hand-fitted the Mutoscope with Edison's original film of Topsy's demise. Deigaard's Memorial to Topsy is on permanent display at the Coney One Version of Events, 2011 Archival pigment print Dimensions variable Collection of the artist Island Museum in Brooklyn, New York. Deigaard continues to make art that speaks for and brings attention to those who have no voice - the flora and fauna of planet Earth. Just like Topsy, the creatures that inhabit the Unbidden series are memorialized through her art. Unbidden is an ongoing series of photographs that began in 2007. Using the same infrared camera that hunters use to track animals, Deigaard photographs the fauna that traverse the "No Hunting" zone of her family's 400-acre farm in North Georgia. As the animals pass through Deigaard's land they are safe from the surrounding hunting areas. The raccoon, deer, bobcat, rabbit, turkey and coyote are Deigaard's collaborators in the Unbidden photographs. She trespasses into their world and finds that they are as curious about her as she is about them. Behold [Through Her Eyes], 2011 Archival pigment print Dimensions variable Collection of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art The hunter or the gatherer-a classic dualism in photography- gains resonance when photographing animals. We say to "shoot" or "take" a photo, to "capture" a likeness. There is no informed consent. In the privacy of the woods, to be human is to trespass. My photographic series Unbidden repurposes the stealth of the hunter's camera, inviting a collaboration at the edge of woods and darkness that underscores animal singularity and autonomous response. -Lee Deigaard 56 LOUISIANA ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES * Winter 2013-14  http://www.ogdenmuseum.org

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of LCV Winter 2013-14

LCV Winter 2013-14

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