How to Talk About Utopia Without Saying Utopia

Dates
Thursday, April 10 - Sunday April 28

Brief
How to Talk About Utopia Without Saying Utopia, takes as its starting point the history of 19th century California communes. The works in this exhibition consider the relationships between alternative forms of social organization and fictional narratives in order to reflect upon utopias of the past, the present or for the future. Featuring a series of works by Anthony Marcellini and Matthew Rana, this exhibition reflects upon the experience of searching for utopias. The floor of the gallery will be covered in sod. Out of the floor will rise a mound to serve as a platform for public address. Spanning 36 feet across the gallery wall will be the Karl Marx Tree, a life-size painting of the largest sequoia in the world and a marker disputing its 'official' name. In addition to this work will be the Inward Looking or Outward Facing (Bench) a utilitarian sculpture based on non-hierarchical structures, which will also house a utopian resource library.

Also on Saturday, April 19th beginning at 5pm, an all-night film program where individuals can bring sleeping bags and/or tents to spend the night watching films and videos showing different representations of utopia.

Artists
Anthony Marcellini / Matthew David Rana

Exhibition Images and Notes
Notes by the artists
Photos taken by Sarah Thatcher

How to Talk About Utopia Without Saying Utopia
Grass sod, wood, paint, photocopies, wine bottle, video, and audio
Installation View, Dimensions variable
2008

These three slides show installation views of the exhibition, How to Talk About Utopia Without Saying Utopia (HTAUWSU), a project which dealt with examining fiction, hope and memory within the history of utopia or utopias. The show comprised original works and appropriated documents created by Anthony Marcellini and Matthew Rana in response to a series of journeys to three nineteenth century social utopian communes from Northern California, Alturia, Icaria-Speranza and Kaweah. All works presented in the exhibition were meant to be experienced and read, in relation to each other as one work�an exhibition as installation. Grass sod was laid on the floor of the entire gallery to both physically tie all of the works together while also transforming the gallery space into a commons, facilitating group assembly and changing the viewer�s relationship to the gallery space from one of apprehension, to relaxation and engagement. The first image shows two audience members sitting on top of the Inward Looking Outward Facing Bench, an octagonal bench and bookshelf containing resource materials related to the exhibition. This work was envisioned as a non-hierarchical sculpture allowing audience members to sit and view the show, chat or read. Also visible behind the audience members And in the second image is an almost full size painting of one of the largest sequoias in the untied states, which became an emblem of the socialist society Kaweah.

Karl Marx Tree and Karl Marx Tree Plaque
Grass sod, wood, and paint
Installation view and detail, dimensions variable
2008

These two photos display two works from the exhibition HTAUWSU, the Karl Marx Tree Plaque, and the Karl Marx Tree. The Karl Marx Tree Plaque is a wooden sculpture contesting the pivotal renaming of one of the largest sequoia trees in the world. This tree was named 'Karl Marx' by the Kaweah colony and then renamed 'General Sherman' by the National Park Service when the National Park Service expropriated the Kaweah colonies land and turned the area into a national park. The plaque is modeled on the design of the Park Service's General Sherman plaque with the name Karl Marx carved into it replacing the former general. Behind and in images 06-07 can be seen an almost full-scale painting of the Karl Marx Tree. The actual tree measures 35 feet in diameter, it was painted at 95% to scale and cut off at the ceiling in order to fit the gallery space.

Inward Looking Outward Facing Bench
Grass sod, wood, and paint, photocopies, decal, and wine bottle
Installation view, dimensions variable
2008

This image again shows the Inward Looking Outward Facing Bench from the exhibition HTAUWSU. The megaphone, seen here placed on top of the bench, was used by various participants to present speeches concerning utopian themes within the gallery space. Making the gallery a forum for public addresses was a further way to imagine changing the condition of the gallery from a private space to a public commons like those public meeting places built into the architecture of many utopia colonies.

Historical Marker: Imagined Revision, Revision, and Final Resolution
Grass sod, wood, and paint, photocopies, decal, and wine bottle
Installation view, dimensions variable
2008

This slide indicates the work Historical Marker: Imagined Revision, Revision, and Final Resolution from the exhibition HTAUWSU. These three framed documents illustrate the decisiveness in the wording used in public historical markers. They exhibit three stages of texts describing the communal society Icaria-Speranza to be used as a description on a California Historical Marker located at the site of the former colony's land. On the left is a fictionalized text, written by the artists, imagined to be the most radical description of this society. Bureaucratic edits have been written over the text to indicate the more subversive language used. In the center is to an actual document, copied from county records which recounts correspondence between the city council and the historical society. Again here words have been marked that might be read as controversial. At the right is the final wording of the marker.

Undertones of the Common Soil
Digital print adhered to wine bottle
Installation view and detail dimensions variable
2008

This image displays Undertones of the Common Soil a sculpture presented as part of HTAUWSU. This sculpture presentes a 'detourned' bottle of Ravenswood wine, a winery which has vineyards on the former land of Icaria Speranza. This altered bottle features a new text describing the wines nose and flavor as influenced by the radicalism at the roots of its vines.

How to Talk About Utopia Without Saying Utopia
Digital print, video projection, wood and grass sod
Installation view, dimensions variable
2008

This slide displays another installation view. Here can be seen the piece Circling Eagle/Vulture a video depicting a circling bird shot from the former site of the Alturia colony. This video depicts a bird of prey, which initially appears to be an eagle-symbolic of power and honor-but is soon revealed to be a vulture or a buzzard, a bird that feeds on the dead. This images was used as a metaphore for the failures of Utopia while also indicating the cycle of birth, death and rebirth in Utopian imaginings.
On the left bottom are featured three pieces of narrative prose, collaboratively written by both artists Anthony Marcellini and Matthew Rana. These texts recount their experiences, and dreams while searching for the sites of social utopias. These texts were envisioned as artworks which also function as didactic panels for the exhibition, giving hints towards the meaning of the works in the show without fully explaining everything.