A Failure Of Memory
2015
graphite pencil, woven trash can, sheets of paper, plaster, gauze
Dimensions variable, as installed: 37 W x 49 L x 5 H inches
A Failure of Memory functions as both drawing and/or sculpture. A woven trashcan and sheets of paper undergo the methodical process of being completely encased in graphite pencil. This drawing action preserves the unprecious, renders an error valuable and conceals anything that may have been originally discernible. The once two-dimensional surface becomes three-dimensional through a premeditated failure. Shpungin translates materials and techniques based on her late surgeon fathers methods in both medicine and domestic life as a form of apprenticeship and commemoration. The trashcan is dissected and bandaged giving an inanimate object a peculiar sense of longing and a new empathetic quality. Conceptually the work points to ideas of false, absent or undesirable memory recollection, while the widely familiar symbol of a mistake (a discarded crumpled sheet of paper), becomes the purposeful means to the end, dictating the entirety of the process.