20 February—29 March 1997

Alan Flint

Mercer Union is pleased to present a text piece by Hamilton artist Alan Flint in the window.

The Mercer Union window space is an exhibition site with a natural duality. Viewers pass by the window, perhaps not knowing the context of the work, but are still afforded the visual interaction. Those who view the art from inside the space, are perhaps more intent on a contemplative experience. Like the exhibition space itself, Alan Flint's window installation plays on the interaction between two visual systems: written language and our reading of the physical world. On the outside of the windows, Flint has installed the letters STUPID cut from mirrored plexi-glass, which appear backwards when read from the street. From inside the gallery, the unmirrored back of the word reads correctly. Flint has chosen the word "stupid" as a metaphor for the inferiority of language when drawn in comparison to our perception of the literal world. Flint elaborates, "People can learn to think one way with language, but what they see often has nothing to do with what they think."
Reid Diamond

Information

Alan Flint lives and works in Hamilton, Ontario. He received his MFA from Concordia University, Montreal, 1989. His more recent solo shows include an exhibition at the Niagara Artist's Centre in 1996 and at the Art Gallery of Hamilton in 1995.