Currently, passersby gazing into the windows of the Space Gallery in Portland see the work of two Bowdoin artists: Adjunct Lecturer of Art Randy Reiger and Visual Arts Technician Kyle Downs. While the two installations share a venue, they differ in content and medium.
Downs' installation, "Host," consists entirely of plywood sculptures.
"My work focuses heavily on form, construction, and the preservation of raw materials," Downs said in an interview on the Space Gallery Web site. "'Host' essentially is the parasitic transformation of plywood that feeds off of harsh living conditions." The crude material of the plywood stands in contrast to the clean, bright, white walls of the gallery.
Downs' exhibit also provides a strong contrast to Reiger's installation, "Now Your Spacecraft Will Be Your Peace." The installation is part of a grant from the Maine Arts Commission and Space Gallery-funded project called "Windowkammers." The centerpiece of the installation is a "slightly charred and flight-scarred 1950s vintage single passenger spacecraft that is accompanied by a flight suit, boots, helmet and other ephemera that document its authenticity as an actual historical artifact," according to Reiger. The Space Gallery is not the first stop for the craft; besides being in space, it was featured at the Bonnaroo music festival last summer.
The text on the panels describing the craft and the accompanying artifacts have been run through translation software into Russian and then back into English, which gives it a Soviet flavor.
Reiger's art has involved the subject of space travel for some time now.
"My spacecraft work began in 2001 as an experiment with the intersection of science and art," he said on the Gallery site. "My mentor while building the piece was an award-winning physics professor who, while bemused at the futility of the craft's perceived celestial ambitions, nevertheless held me strictly, as was possible, to task regarding a multitude of formal scientific concerns, at least as far as aesthetics were concerned."
According to the site, in the "Windowkammers" exhibition, "three Maine artists have designed and built large-scale dioramas to be installed in storefront windows throughout Portland. These window environments, inspired by the dioramas found in museums, are three-dimensional models depicting real or imagined phenomena, people, places or events."
While it may seem almost too coincidental for two Bowdoin artists to occupy the same Portland gallery at the same time, the occurrence was entirely by chance, according to Reiger.
"I have just recently begun to work with Kyle in my capacity as a Bowdoin adjunct art faculty and I cannot speak for his beautiful work in the Space Gallery window," he said. "It is actually a separate endeavor, and Kyle and I had not yet formally met when we were installing our respective works."