Riderless2003

I am fascinated by the technology of the nineteenth century, the birth of film and its inextricable link to the Victorian sensibility. The hallmark of this aesthetic lies in its tightly-laced obsession with detail and decoration, decorum and charm. All objects, from a memory quilt to a camera, were compulsively lavished with the same ornamental decorations. While on one level my modernity is repelled by this fussiness, on another level I feel oddly liberated by this outrageously sensual adornment of objects, regardless of their function. Yet the Victorian fixation on complicated patterning belies a fear of the empty space. I feel there is, within their flourishes, a language I must decipher. To get close enough, to get inside the design is to see patterns of desire, patterns of repression, a pattern that blossoms to encompass generations. –S. W.