Entitled “Sweet Dreams”, this woodcut print is an edition of 5 prints. For this project, I wanted to reflect on the relationship between public and private, and the question social control in public spaces.
An increasingly used method of social control in public spaces is what is known as “hostile architecture”. One of the cruelest aspects of this is when urban design, and especially urban furniture design, incorporates elements that make it uncomfortable, or downright impossible, to lie down, with the intended goal of removing homeless people from public spaces. Spikes, like the one I depict in this work, are often placed in areas that offer shelter against bad weather, such as window ledges.
By making a single, oversized stud the only subject of this work, I want to bring this often-unnoticed object to the viewer’s attention, scaling it to match, in magnitude, the effect it has on some of the most vulnerable among us.
Plate size: approx. 8" x 8" (20 cm x 20 cm)
Paper size: 11" x 15" (28 cm x 38 cm)
Printed on BFK Rives paper
Created in October 2019
An increasingly used method of social control in public spaces is what is known as “hostile architecture”. One of the cruelest aspects of this is when urban design, and especially urban furniture design, incorporates elements that make it uncomfortable, or downright impossible, to lie down, with the intended goal of removing homeless people from public spaces. Spikes, like the one I depict in this work, are often placed in areas that offer shelter against bad weather, such as window ledges.
By making a single, oversized stud the only subject of this work, I want to bring this often-unnoticed object to the viewer’s attention, scaling it to match, in magnitude, the effect it has on some of the most vulnerable among us.
Plate size: approx. 8" x 8" (20 cm x 20 cm)
Paper size: 11" x 15" (28 cm x 38 cm)
Printed on BFK Rives paper
Created in October 2019