Jaleesa Johnston - Conduits
In the 2023 season, Visiting Artist Jaleesa Johnston will continue to develop the series Conduits (formerly Conjure Objects) at the park. The series is a continuation of Jaleesa's ongoing practice of temporary, performative sculptures that began in 2018. These objects mirror performance in their brief existence and prompt dismantling. Jaleesa is based in Portland, Oregon. Presented with the challenge of bringing the sculptures into being from opposite coasts, Jaleesa and Artistic Director Sayward Schoonmaker developed a collaborative scheme. Working from Jaleesa's conceit and sketches of the works, the two collect objects from their respective locations, which are then installed on specific sites on Stone Quarry's grounds.
The first sculpture in the series Crossings in the Secret Garden (above). The work, comprising synthetic hair braid, found chairs, and found bowls, which collected fallen leaves and offerings from park visitors, was recently de-installed.
The second in the series, Suspended Bodies, is on view through the windows of the Hilltop House's plant room (below).
Jaleesa Johnston on the work:
"Suspended Bodies (2022) is a sculpture of a bone strung from a synthetic hair braid. Using the bone to reference an unknowable body or bodies, the piece echoes suspension as a form of death (via hangings and lynchings) and as an indication of liminal/inbetween space evoked in the image of being ungrounded. Initially thought of as a pendulum, Suspended Bodies is also an acknowledgement of beings that exist beyond the physical plane. This work is an extension of the Conduits series (formerly known as Conjure Objects), which is a series of temporary sculptures that take inspiration from ancestor veneration and altar-building within Black diasporic spiritual practices. I incorporate found objects, other people's objects, performance remnants and purchased objects to create assemblages that relate to architectural and bodily space. Conduits recontextualize everyday objects to conjure something beyond their mundane existence. The building of each sculpture is often a play with different possibilities in the form of sketches based on the spaces and materials that I have on hand. For the Conduits works at the Stone Quarry Hill Art Park, I worked with Sayward to first identify a few interesting locations and available objects that I could work with. From there, I sketched out a few possibilities, with almost all of them involving braids from some of my other sculptural and performance works. The process of working on Conduits objects is a mix of intuition and reading double meanings and alternative signifiers for the objects involved. In this specific case, I really enjoy the collaborative nature of the piece where the work comes to fruition through hands other than my own."