&nbsp;

ARTIST STATEMENT

&nbsp;

My work consists in mapping contemporary existence. I am equally interested in the urban environment, museum collections and traces of tensions in human relations. I create sets of visuals and texts and gather evidence from the street. Then, I put these elements to work to distill an atmosphere or generate narratives.

&nbsp;

For the past ten years, part of my work has consisted in questioning residential and geo-political hierarchies by promoting the attractions of disadvantaged suburbs, industrial ports, abandoned steelworks and obscure corners of the former Soviet empire. I collect material during field trips or long-term residencies and then process the elements into pseudo-tourist promotion campaigns. My approach appears offbeat because I sing the praises of places that are not necessarily where people imagine spending their vacation. The form of this undertaking depends both on the location itself and the exhibiting context (art center, public commission, billboard, website, etc.). Works are as likely to be industrially produced as hand-made. My research may find its ultimate form as a pdf file or a large-scale, lasting part of the urban landscape.

&nbsp;

The <em>Museums of the World</em> project (2009 – 2015) also sought to capture the identity of a given place, this time through the prism of its museum collections. Line drawings were made to inventory objects contained in a range of museums across 33 cities in Europe, Asia, North Africa, North America and Australia. Then a collage combining two particularly revealing objects attempted to embody the spirit of place.

&nbsp;

More recently, having reduced the distances I travel, I have begun to map social relations and the way technology modifies the way we interact. The downloadable booklets I produce allow me to experiment with associations of texts (of my own composition or borrowed) and visuals. I look at the formatting of our personal, commercial or administrative exchanges by juxtaposing drawings of flowers and received sms or emails (<em>Vie parisienne</em>). I report back on my strange journeys by juxtaposing narrative snippets and pictograms (<em>Détour</em>). I document traces of current events in graffiti, spam and statistics (<em>Journaux</em>). An interactive on-line card game (<em>Oracle</em>) including prophetic pronouncements in French and English recreates the atmosphere generated by the Covid-19 pandemic.

&nbsp;

My work as a whole reveals a curiosity for distant countries, what is just outside my front door and what appears on my computer screen.

&nbsp;

Heidi Wood

&nbsp;