Them Bones
Laura Clair Perry
See it On Campus: Level 2
Vancouver Biennale “Art Attack” Award — Honourable Mention
A culmination of both my painting and sculptural practice, this project takes the form of a diptych and a sculpture — exploring themes of death, fossilization, and the role fossil fuels play in powering our digital age.
The diptych, Dinos, consists of two large canvases with sculptural forms made of plaster, paper, and glue integrated into the canvas surface. One of the canvases incorporates bone-like forms, symbolizing organic life, DNA, and decay. The other canvas’s sculptural elements resemble binary digits and represent the ethereal. Both works are painted with shapes suggestive of dinosaurs and modern infrastructure. This work needs to exist in its current form. When exploring sculptural elements in a painting, the question “why not a sculpture?” is often asked. This piece provides the answer. The three-dimensional forms require the painting; they do not exist outside of it.
The sculpture, Bone Throne, is a rocking chair that appears to be made of black bones, constructed with clay and the chair of a dead man. Painted in an oily, pitch-black mixture of vinyl and acrylic, this piece links the process of dying with fossil fuel dependency — evoking the interconnected cycle of life and death present in both humanity and the natural world.
Humor is a deliberate strategy in my practice, used as an artistic medium to lighten the room and perhaps even evoke laughter — achieving this through combinations of suggestive forms, odd placements, contrasting colors, and scale. While there may be disturbing undertones, the intention of this project is to generate optimism out of realism. The bright colours of the painting provide hope and exuberance against the contrasting black, while the cartoon-like bone structures on the chair serve to remind us that humour is a coping mechanism for the fear. This project reflects my interest in material play and cultural decay, riding the blur between pop and camp while responding to the aesthetics of extinction and the late capitalist spectacle.
