…And Still I Wander South is a virtual artwork produced in response to the unique open call for solo show proposals from the Florida-based gallery Coco Hunday. For this open call, the gallery published a library of all submissions they received, whether selected in the gallery programming or not and guidelines for proposals were completely open to any format. In response, I produced a to-scale mock-up of the gallery space in Unity. It houses a video work of a religious hymn-style arrangement of the hardcore punk band Knocked Loose song, And Still I Wander South (The works namesake). The visuals serve as the church lyric video accompanying the music while piles of dirt inhabit the floor.
On the initial surface, the proposal for video installation work could be a legitimate proposal. However, if the viewer spends an extended amount of time within the project, the sound will change to prompt them to press a secret key. Upon pressing it, the door to the gallery will open, and the viewer will find themself in a vast digital world. The gallery from which they emerge becomes a surreal object plopped within a field of digital flowers inhabited by obscure subcultural figures discussing their metaphysical state of being. They pose the questions of whether they live in a mock-up of a nonexisting work waiting to be born or if they are the work itself, and this is, in fact, their final destination in the goggle drive of the gallery.
The directors at Coco Hunday have carved out a new space that speaks to a meta-conversation about artists and the ritual of proposals and open calls. In response, this work takes root in the offside digital limbo as its primary mode of existence.
The work can be downloaded and viewed at the gallery website alongside all the other proposals they received. It will also be presented at the Cora Stafford Gallery at the University of North Texas as my MFA thesis show on April 27th- 30th.