It is difficult to isolate the specific essence that makes up Angela Zammarelli’s work, but when you see it, you might guess that she is inviting you to play. Much of her art is an accumulation of performance, soft sculpture, collage, bookmaking, installation, and video (often put together in one piece) that incorporates a fantastical world of structures and characters that seemingly act as protection to the artist. It’s unclear if the protection is guarding from something in reality or something lurking in her dreamlike universe. Regardless it is reminiscent of the surreal fort-making world of childhood filled with outrageous plot lines and codes and signs only to be deciphered with contact and time. There are references to domesticity, DIY, architecture, and childhood wrapped up in the humor of Guy Ben-Ner and the feel of Annette Messager.
In Making New Friends in Old Places (2009), Zammarelli walked the streets of Northampton, MA, wearing a portable doll fort, made up of countless handmade dolls. The mound of dolls appears in various places on the street handing out books to surprised and curious passer-bys. The book reads, “Look for me. I may be by the shrubs or a parking meter,” and has colorful drawing and cloth on its pages. Suddenly, the sturdy and playfully arranged hill bolts up and Zammarelli’s legs take the fort on the run to its next location. At one point in the video documentation a viewer exclaims, “Oh god this is cute!”
Zammarelli also performed this piece at the Art Shanty (coolest idea for an exhibition ever!) Projects in Minnesota. On her blog she writes, “Something I have been noticing when performing in public is that people want to take your picture. This is fine maybe even great, but sometimes I worry that they just take your picture but really don't think about what is happening in the performance and why you might be doing it. I wonder if it gets thrown up to being wacky and that's about it?”
It’s really difficult to judge what viewers think, but as whole when one presents publicly the artist relinquishes that control as they open the work to other’s eyes and minds. Yet although the initial reaction might be “ that’s cute,” that first response is an important entry into the continual deliberation by the viewer. Work that is invested in humor, has the capability then to proceed forward in any direction following the first laugh.
Her video performance Kitchen Transgressions is not to be missed as she wears a brillo dress and cleans broken dishes on the floor. And her more recent I Want Want Want You is a return of the fort with dreamy earnestness that is embedded in the blurry world seen in a video inside the fort.
Currently Zammarelli is spending a few months in residency at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts where she is working on an installation and video. Hopefully when she returns to her studio in Easthampton, we will get a chance to check out the new work. In the meantime follow her developments on her blog here.
