Failed Geographies

FAILED GEOGRAPHIES

Art & Essay by Jason Blasso

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FAILED GEOGRAPHIES

C H A RY B D I S P R E S S new york

Published by Charybdis Press New York Copyright © Charybdis Press 2015 All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America 15 14 13 12 4 3 2 1 First Printing This book may be used within the parameters set by the Creative Commons.

See www.creativecommons.org for more details.

This book is set in Whitman & Rockwell Book edited and designed by Jason Blasso www. charybdispress.com www.blackgesso.com

In a failed geography, no one ever arrives...

Overcoming Geography I’m writing this on the eve of my home passing its first inspection. This is significant because this small series of panels — and many other works currently under production — would never have existed without the trials and tribulations involved with getting my house to its current stage.

After leaving the city, I looked to purchase a small, inexpensive home on Long Island. As luck would have it, I found the perfect little house with a pond, a fireplace and a detached garage that I could use as my art studio. I dreamed of settling in and writing and working — but that wasn’t to be, as one misfortune followed upon the next.

After a long battle with the banks, I won the house and no sooner were the walls opened that a new source of trouble was found. The small amount of money I had earmarked for repairs had been siphoned away to another costly mistake and I was left alone with a gutted house and heart. Here the geography failed me and the home I bought seemed cursed.

But I loved the place, and with the vision of its final form in mind, I held on tight. With little money, I had to learn to do the work myself. I borrowed and bought tools and materials, laid out the plans and threw myself into it.

I began by executing the tasks one by one, on my own time and on my own terms. With every success and setback, my skills, tools and knowledge increased until there were no projects beyond my capacities and I had an intimate working knowledge of my home.

The idea for this series came about during the demo when I was pulling up the floor in the living room/dining room and saw the rich blacks and browns of the tar and old asbestos tiles beneath the newer linoleum. I decided to make something of it before throwing it out and so I set the large nail-ridden sheets aside.

When the bulk of my labors were done, I treated myself to building frames from some left over 2 x 4s I had. I cut the wood flooring to roughly fit the frames and used the old nails to hammer them in place. When the six were completed, I hung them on the wall, took photos of them and sent them off to my friend.

The name came up while we texted about the pictures. What will you call it?, he asked. Failed Geography, I replied.

And that was it. I typed it without thinking. The name spoke and I listened. But what did it mean?

My friend whom I was texting, lives in California and I, in New York. Here geography failed us but technology overcame that obstacle. This was the first failure and triumph.

My friend then pointed out how some of the shapes were uncontained by the Cartesian grid. This seemed true as the breaks in the wood panel penetrated the substrate and the asbestos tiles sat above the grid lines. Here the topography broke out of two-dimensions and entered into Euclidean space. This, then, was the second failure and triumph.

Then, my friend suggested that perhaps the title of Failed Geography was too much for the whole series and should be contained to one panel in particular. I said that I would think on it and left it at that. But the name stuck and it seemed to fit the mood of the pieces and the conditions under which they were made.

Over the course of my home’s construction, I became more capable than I was before as my daily struggle became a source of intimate insight. This, then, would be the third failure and triumph as what seemed at first a cursed place became the very site of my transcendence.

Further, it was while working on my home that the great structure of my novel came into being. The general idea is this: All points are one point and that point is god. Thus, in a failed geography, no one ever arrives because one is always where they need to be.

Failed Geography 1 1/4” wood subfloor, tar, asbestos tile, galvanized nails, mold 48 x 48”

Failed Geography 2 1/4” wood subfloor, tar, asbestos tile, galvanized nails, mold 48 x 48”

Failed Geography 3 1/4” wood subfloor, tar, asbestos tile, galvanized nails, mold 48 x 48”

Failed Geography 4 1/4” wood subfloor, tar, asbestos tile, galvanized nails, mold 48 x 48”

Failed Geography 5 1/4” wood subfloor, tar, asbestos tile, galvanized nails, mold 48 x 48”

Failed Geography 6 1/4” wood subfloor, tar, asbestos tile, galvanized nails, mold 48 x 48”

FAILED ART SHOW

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