Convergence is the approach toward a definite value, a definite point, a common view or opinion, or toward a fixed or equilibrium state.

Hosted by Mira Malatestinic and the MIRA Salon Series in May 2010, artists Wendy D and Dori Luthy-Harrison present Convergence, a mixed media installation and video projection that is the result of several days of intimate sharing and mapping of the women’s lives. The work documents the convergences of their lives that result from variety of choices (major and minor, both their own and others) that have defined each of their lives. But unique as these individual stories may be, the points of overlap are greater than they could imagine.

Wendy is a photographer and Dori is a sculptor, and both women focus on capturing human experience through their respective media. But Convergence steps outside of their traditional media, bringing the women together to create this installation as an abstract map marking the path of each woman’s life, the ebb and flow, but will remain unfinished in the knowing that we all approach the same moment of convergence in the finality of life.

The following video summarizes the many hours of sharing and mapping that the women were engaged in, and was shown on the opening night of the exhibition.

Click link to open the Quicktime video:
CONVERGENCE

Employing ceramics and mixed media in the creation of sculptures, Dori Luthy-Harrison’s current work is influenced by her own experiences growing up as a female in western society, specifically exploring the ways in which a woman’s identity is tied to her choices around reproduction, domesticity, and home-making.

Using the imagery of nesting and birdhouses, combined with traditional symbols of femininity, the work draws quirky and quiet parallels between the way both birds and women are encouraged in their roles as homemakers. By contrasting the female body, often truncated and attached to other forms, and highlighting the beauty of the shapes with a variety of textures, colours and patterns, each sculpture begs to tell it’s own story about woman finding self.

Employing ceramics as the medium, and using both hand-building and wheel-throwing techniques to create forms that reference eggs, nuts, or stones, which act as physical metaphors to describe the beginnings of life, natural processes,and objects that occur without human intervention or invention. Then juxtaposing what are obvious human made marks and manipulations onto these natural objects through different surface treatment, marring the surface with incisions, or augmenting with extrusions.

Similar to finding an extraordinary rock on the beach, or a uniquely shaped vegetable in the market, the viewer stops to wonder. What is this? How did it become this way? Where did it come from? What made it like this? These ceramic objects beg the same questions from viewers, which is to wonder the mystery of their existence and meaning.

Yet, the significance of the work is not only in the physical object, but also lies in the mind that gazes in interest. With the same questions that were asked during the making, the object’s meaning is re-created during the moment of pondering by the viewer.