Portal Into Twentieth Century Banking
commissioned for and owned by FirstBank for their new Green Hills, Nashville location through The Arts Company Gallery.
49.5"W x 77"H x 3.5"D
Archival stamp ink on rag paper, pigment prints on rag paper and cut rag paper, thread, wood, task board, plexiglass, glass orbs, pigment prints on mylar, leather, enamel paint re-purposed typewriter parts, specimen pins.
Archival prints of original bank ledger sheets from 1916-1947 form a stitched, grid base for the construction of images referencing the function and philosophy of banking from the early 20th century into the beginning of the contemporary era. The roots and growth of the bank, symbolized by the banks tree logo, flow over the tellers desks, ledgers, and state map sections. The original bank location and the new Green Hills location are marked with glass optical orbs in the map section of the western part of the state. The mechanisms and tools of the record keeping of banking are represented by the vintage typewriter parts that appear over the old, handwritten ledgers. The ink found on the ledgers changes by the year, most dramatically in some samples from the 1930 ledger, one of the most traumatic banking years in US history, where pages would fluctuate from full strength ink, to watered down ink, to pencil, then back again to full strength ink, demonstrating the thrift and persistence that enabled the bank to weather even the toughest of times.
 |
| detail |
 |
| detail |
 |
| detail |
There is a really nice collection of art in this new bank. Some of the other artists represented are Andy Saftel, Norman Lerner, Phil Savage to name a few. The commissioned work was from both myself and
Carrie McGee.
Installation
Carrie McGee makes transparent resin sculptural work that is either wall hung or suspended. The imagery in them is from both chemical reactions and photography.
They are wire hung with some really cool hardware she gets from Japan. This piece fits into the banks rotunda.
The buildings architect,Carin Jeffords of Vaughan Associates Architects, and The Arts Company director Anne Brown look on as Carrie describes the process of getting photographs she had taken of the buildings steel beams in the early stages of construction into the resin.
Both McGee's and my work are just installed, along with some really slick new high tech bank machinery. My piece was an easy install- just a simple oak French cleat hanging bar with 3 screws, and it was good!
