Robyn O’Neil:

Robyn O’Neil:

200640" x 30.67"Archival pigment print

Visual Weight

This series stems from my experience as a security guard at the Frye Art Museum. I spent hours each day silently walking through the galleries, growing familiar with each new show, and in a broader sense, with the ways any show interacts with the gallery space.

There is a specific procedure involved in installation and deinstallation of exhibits. When a show is finished, its gallery is blocked off from the general public. First the art is removed, then the walls are patched and painted, then the new show installed; and only then is the lighting changed. Because of this there is a long period of time where certain galleries consist of nothing but blank walls, still lit for specifically sized artworks, now absent. As I would pass through these rooms I still found myself relating to these light-artifacts as having a concrete presence, a visual weight independent of the missing work, retained by the preserved layout. The art was initially hung with a certain composition dependent not just on content, but on size and shape and quantity; through the leftover lighting, I was presented with a new exhibit, cut off from the rest of the museum, from the general public, cut off from even artistic intention.

Each photograph in this series is titled after the removed work.

Everything

Group by:

Speaking Loudly With Gentle Materials

Constructed Narrative

An Exercise in Formal Composition

Flowers and Fabric

A Playful Photo Opportunity

Other

Sculpture

Installation

Head Sets

The Idea and The Thing Itself

Awkwardness

Nesting

Tiny Nintendo Paintings

Bouquet

I’m Pretty Sure This Is Exactly Right

Living Room Triptych

Social Distancing Content

Fortune Cookies

Partum

Restoration Series

Symmetry

Visual Weight