Paparazzi Ethnography

Cutting, balancing, painting, sewing, carving, tying, grating – these are some of the words that Vanesa Gingold uses to describe assembling her Kite Mobiles, on display at the CellSpace Art Gallery on Bryant Street, way, way, south of Market in San Francisco.

Vanesa also uses the word Dappled to describe the effect her work has on spaces where the Kite Mobile casts a shadow (Dappled – past tense of dap·ple. Verb: To mark with spots or rounded patches: e.g., “dappled sunlight lay across the balcony”).

In her installation– cloth stretches across wooden frames taking the shape of a toy kite. Strings hang from the corners to support delicately carved paper leaves. The effect of Kite Mobiles, as Vanesa describes it, is akin to a forest canopy, with light streaming through the cut paper, reflecting different shapes on the floor, walls, and body parts.

To more fully enage with the canopy, I laid on the floor to photograph the installation vertically.

Looking up through the trees I began sharing her perspective. Vanesa also uses hand gesture when talking about her work. Kite Mobiles are created from recycled materials.

The leaves of the canopy are discarded prints. The kite cloth is carved up old clothing. The yarn and threads that connect the entire contraption appear old, frayed, but durable. Only the box cutter she uses to make the razor sharp cuttings is new.

Each piece of the mobile takes about 30 minutes to assemble, create, cut out. If you count each piece, multiply the sum by 30, add extra time for balancing, and tying, plus grating, because the edges of the kite frame are shaved — each Kite Mobile, based on rough estimates, and working steadily, could be assembled in 4 to 5 hours. That’s my guess.

Mobiles are known for their movement. They are in constant motion.


So are the shadow images that these mobiles cast as they twist to and fro, mostly from being bumped by art gallery goers, as they pass the installation. But mobiles also invite nudges and pushes. They accept and display the kinetic energy of touch.

It’s not often that you come across art that is interactive. As I witnessed the crowded space, I saw revelers touch the Kite Mobiles with their hands, but often times, they did so with their shoulders, by backing into them without intention, making room for party goers to squeeze by.

Across from Vanesa’s work, and in contrast to its ephemeral quality — a refinery explosion proof lamp sat mounted on a teak wooden pedastal.

The untitled beacon was the work of molecular biologist Heiko Greb, who recently left Genentech after ten years to concentrate his effort more on art.

Heiko, talented in so many ways, originates from southern Germany. I have the impression that he carries a nostalgic Heideggerian sensibility for celebrating the organic in relation to the industrially manufactured. In an earlier posting, I mention briefly Martin Heidegger‘s The Origin of the Work of Art in the context of materials that take on the effects of the human touch (e.g., wood).

And these materials, Heidegger contrasts to modern products that, no matter how much you interact with them (e.g., refrigerator door handle), never is there left the patina of humanness.

Nevertheless, something nagged me about this particular piece of work, as if I had seen it before. Some time later, sharing a drink in Slow Club, a restaurant nearby, I had the vision that Heiko’s untitled beacon shares a similar quality to the creosote lamps that dot the bay, indicating to fishing boats the depths of inlets.

For some time now, the San Francisco bay has been in-filled, to build homes, schools, factories and the like. Consequently, many of these creosote nautical lamps are no longer in use. Some lamps however, have since become garden fixtures because they were literally, surrounded by development, when parts of the bay were filled in, and the laborers just left these lamps in place.

As these images depict, taken from the backyard of my father’s home in Tiburon, creosote nautical lamps continue to be a visible part of the landscape.