Brigham Baker Portfolio
Quiltscapes 2022 Public Workshop with Lectures, Performances Zollikerstrasse 249, 10th-16th January
“Quiltscapes” is a collective research as well as a shared experience platform with a framework that offers a guidance consisting of materials, tools, skill-trading as well as theoretical input in the form of knowledge exchange and performative acts. A new kind of social contact is enabeled through handcraft and materiality. People are invited to bring old textiles, clothes and tools to participate in quilting, patch-working and hand-sewing together. No experience was required and meals and sleeping places would be provided. Guests continue to add and edit layers collectively, creating a social fabric consisting of multiple origins and authors. Additional programing included events such as: The La Dépendance Vinyl Library „The Making of Judy Chicago‘s Dinner Party“ With intro from Gritli Faulhaber „Dream Quilts“ by San Keller & Tom Huber „Teeppich“ by Kathrin Füglister Performances from collective NoDIN (Mira Studer, Yadin Bernauer, und Sophie Germanier) „Rag‘n‘Drop“ by Myriam Uzor & Sonja Flury Traum eines lächerlichen Menschen“ by Fjodor Dostojewski Gelesen von Benedikt Bock „Never ending Soup“ Cooking concept by Francesco Cagnin Original Flyer
Lisitoning Session with Yadin Bernauer
Spalierhaus 2021 7.5x2.5 meters Pavillion for Schulhaus Strickhof, Wädenswil Theater with students planed in June 2022 in collaboration with Jelena Moser
The spatial sculpture explores simultaneous temporalities and principles of order, containing within itself the character of the draftsperson‘s abstract will to create. The boundary between human-made and that which has arisen through natural growth is deliberately distorted in a playful manner. The spatial sculpture for a horticultural school is found in between the library, greenhouses, and boarding home for the young out of town students. Consisting of a freestanding aluminum grid, recognisable as a fragment of a house-façade, Ambiguity of space it is reinforced by furniture made of the same materiality. Over the coming years and through the seasons, a wide variety of interaction with the supporting structure is created. The grid structure was drawn and scratched and poured using the hearth-sand casting method. Traces of resistance and slight deviations from the perfect line remain recognisable indications of the process. Through the physical act in the production, the resulting organic-looking lines, takes distance from a serial and industrial production. The work performed by humans comes closer to a „natural“ process and draws parallels to the growth of plants, asserting temporal resistances. Since centuries, two-dimensional trellis structures of our species served to cultivate plants and increase their productivity. Originally from the French (espalier) or Italian (spalla), the term “Spalier” already refers to the physical human dimension of the shoulder, which in this context is indissolubly intertwined with that of the plants. Starting from this spatially banal construct and its culture of taming, placed in the context of an educational institution, it is meant to allow a space of retreat outside of a productivity and norm - without lecturing. And those who follow the invitation and explore this place attentively will also be able to discover a quote by Emily Dickinson sketched into the metal, „the world is a haunted home, that what we make of it we wish to be.“ Excerpt of text by Kathrin Füglister Spalierhaus, detail (before planting)
Spalierhaus,
Sweepings 3.7x 6.5meter Palazzina, Basel 2020
A landscape with various steps and thresholds were pourd in conOutside the space in the surrounding nieghborhood, various debris were collected from the streets and then placed over the surface. fragments, which particularly emphasizes the entire structure of curves and lines and allows it to become a drawing in space.
sweepings, detail
exhibition view“Neither the either nor the or are places to be“ With Nina Reiben, Palazzina Basel 2020
Sweepings, detail
Apples C-prints 120x170cm 2019
Photographs of apples from a tree outside my studio window, blossoms of the next year. A publication with the images „Just Apples“ was created with Benedikt Bock and Edition Taube.
Apple
Exhibition view: Eine Einführung. Immer und Immer Wieder, Kunstmuseum Thun, 2021
Eucalyptus 2018 branches, mechanics dimensions varialbe In collaberation with Simple Mechanik (Valentin Altorfer & Nicolas Rüegg assitenz)
Eucaluyptus leaves attatched to motors slowly sweep across glass cieling in Aargauer Kunsthaus, a construction designed let as much diffused the light as much as possible. The room below is dedicated to 18th century landscape painters such as Caspar Wolf and Robert Zünd.
exhbition view, „On the Road. 10 Jahre CARAVAN“ Aargauer Kunsthaus, 2018
detail
view of mechanic above glass cieling
detail
Shade 2017 awning fabric Ø 200 cm
Am I sad. Not so much as I like to think – frustrated maybe. There is a thick layer of skin, muscle, ligament which covers my bones, but it is not me. It is not my body, it is another, one which, somehow, I have chosen to inhabit. Perhaps if I laid in the desert long enough, my skin would crack and peel back, exposing my organs and heart which would shrivel, turn to dust and blow away. The white of my bones would bleach and fray and be left cooking, vaporizing, molecules adrift in hot wind. Would lizards seek shade in my disappearing? Would my consciousness be left? Maybe to play with the sun – the ultimate capital, not only of energy, but of many sub capitals swirling around, constantly rearranging positions. Time functions of that which I am becoming. A spacetimemattering. Could my mind still invent and imagine even though it had lost its form? From Ra to solar panels – all part of my reinvention. Disks of Apep, futile attempts to obscure that which is already there. My chaos, ultimate particles once bones, teeth, sinew, spit and semen, now just sleet and soot staining the concrete of my balcony. text by Roxy Grand
production photograph
exhibition view, La Rada, Locarno, 2017
production photograph
Environs 2017 Tire, Chain, Lightbulb, Water, organic matter 2017
A discared tire outside often contains water even long after other sources have dried up, even in arid landscapes. Rainwater is collected in the lower ring and the evaportation is mostly caught by the upper ring.
quitos are born in such discarded auto tires, due to the situation of moisture, warmth and darkness. While often a symbol of enviormental plight, stacks of tires found in yards, gardens, backstreets, can become dense ecosystem hubs, alongside bugs, live also rodents and some birds. An advantage of such an enviorement largely being that it is often ignored by human activity. Exhibited are used-tires which have been collected from varios locations, with a single light in the center of the ring.
Photograph taken in Omišalj Croatia, 2017
exhibition view, La Rada, Locarno, 2017
detail- Environs