The Object Narrative

BENJAMIN YOUNG’S Material Affair goes like
this: sparse towers of weather-gnawed wood stand in the center of the
Appendix Project Space garage. Against a white wall, half of a frayed
bungee cord is in a scant 3D triptych with a piece of mesh and a pouch
of welding sticks. A multi-dimensional explosion of steel rods joined
with twine spans across a wall and between the ceiling and floor. At
the heart of each study within Material Affair, Young says he’s
exploring the tension implicit to the creation, use, and decay of
modern structure—often looking at balance and impermanence
through an object’s present and past.

According to Young, Material Affair started with the objects
featured in his untitled 3D triptych. As Young found these random
objects, he noticed that while they had been discarded, they all still
held a narrative of creation and use, rooted in natural form (the
unrefined base material) and synthesis (the human input that shapes
unrefined materials into their utilitarian units). For example, the
welding tools started as mined metals and were then processed into thin
sticks.

These observations on natural form and synthesis were then extended
to wood—Young’s three studies on wood occupy the floor space of
the Appendix garage. The first, a stump-wide crosscut, is suspended in
the air from an eyehook. Young says this unrefined slice implies the
first step in processing a felled tree, when a lumberjack cuts off
sections “in his own rhythm… designed for expediency and task (not
for art).” The next piece in the series uses two beams of wood joined
by rubber belts, showcasing the intentionality of the milling
process—cutting logs at specific angles to expose desired
patterns in a beam’s grain. The last assemblage—three logs of
firewood stacked and restrained by a string—shows the
impermanence of structure, only “a pause in a series of possibilities,”
as Young puts it. When added up, these arrangements of wood walk us
through the harvesting, refinement, and decay of lumber-based
products—finding a balanced, yet tension-ridden view of
humanity’s relationship with natural materials.

As a continuation of this study on tension, Young says that his
assemblage of steel rods is “a new form, with its own
history”—held together with twine to accentuate the inevitable
decay of manmade structures. The piece’s right end defines a thesis of
order, featuring rods arranged like scaffolding, in conjoined skeletal
cubes. The center section represents its antithesis, abandoning the
horizontal and vertical lines of the cube pattern in favor of chaotic
planes and random shapes. The final section of the piece opts for a
contemplative medium point between order and chaos, incorporating both
cubic and randomized forms. The overall effect is a thicket of metal
rods growing up a wall and simultaneously toward the
viewer—suggesting that oppositional forces like existence and
decay will always coexist.

Young’s challenging approach to meaning, and Appendix’s decision to
feature such work, is refreshing—creating a point of contrast to
the art institutions around town that are adopting widely accessible
programming in what seems to be a survivalist reaction to the
recession. Because Appendix exists outside of financial
obligations—selling nothing and operating under a low
overhead—the young group of artists that run the gallery have
been able to maintain their curatorial mission: to showcase challenging
conceptual works which inspire discussion. As evidence of this, there
is Benjamin Young’s Material Affair.