Hold: Heidi Schwegler

November 19th – December 19th, 2010

Disjecta presents a new installation by Heidi Schwegler. Hold is an installation of sculpture, audio and projection, which together speak of a moment of anguish. In conventional warfare two opponents confront one another and inflict damage until one side is defeated. Personal struggle, however, is a battle in which the enemy is not external; the enemy is the self. Situated in the mind, it manifests physically within the body and is particularly insidious; it is unnecessary and the opponent does not exist. Outside the mind and body, inner angst is mostly unseen.

Colt Toombs (mixed martial artist and son of the famous World Wrestling Entertainer “Rowdy” Roddy Piper) will stand in as the oppositional force. Filmed with green screen, Colt will put the artist Heidi Schwegler in a variety of defensive holds as she fervently tries to free herself. Each of these moments will discordantly contain moments of humor and futility.

A gate that rhythmically slams shut on a magenta chain link dog run, a jump rope cast in bronze, and a wool blanket suspended in frozen gesture are a few of the pieces to be presented alongside multiple video projections: the artist experiencing a catastrophic moment, Colt reciting text from Rudolf Arnheim’s text Entropy and Art: An Essay on Disorder and Order, and a triptych of monitors that offer “The Perfect Experience.”

Heidi Schwegler explores a wide range of materials in the service of very depressing subject matter. Schwegler constructs artifacts and objects from resin, metal, wood, wax, found objects and digital media. She has participated in numerous group and solo shows, including exhibitions at the Tacoma Art Museum, WA; Scope Art 2004, New York; Museum of Contemporary Craft, Portland, OR; and the Hallie Ford Museum, OR. Schwegler is a recent recipient of a Hallie Ford Fellowship, a MacDowell Fellowship, and several RACC Individual Project Grants that partially funded Hold (2010) and Utopia Sighs (2007). She has lectured on her work and contemporary art and design at institutions such as Cranbrook Academy of Art, MI; Kendall College of Art and Design, MI; , and the University of Washington, Seattle, WA. Reviews of Schwegler’s work have been published in ArtNews, Metalsmith, and American Craft. She earned her MFA from the University of Oregon and is presently Associate Professor of Metals at the Oregon College of Art and Craft.