In addition to the working coaster, it includes photographs, paintings, works on paper and several new coaster-inspired wood sculptures, which he was finishing up with Martín Gonzales, the exhibitions lead fabricator. ∾very day when I leave my place, the threat to my bodily existence is palpable. To share the coaster experience, he added, was in a sleight-of-hand way, to bring people as much as I can to understanding what that feels like, but in a space of joy, of being a human in the world.Ī few weeks after our New Jersey ride, I joined Hill at Mass MoCA, in North Adams, Massachusetts, where he was installing his show. I feel like I understand bodily threat in a very real way, he said. And in the process, it might reveal something about yourself. He is drawn to coasters for their contradictions: the way the ride merges terror with delight how the experience is highly personal, but shared with strangers how amusement parks are in some ways a leveler, mixing people of many backgrounds yet in the past were often segregated, and today, despite their populist atmosphere, typically charge high gate fees.įor Hill, who is Black, queer and from the hood intersecting outsider identities inviting people onto coasters might just convey something about his life experience that a biographical litany cannot. Look, theyre like line drawings, he said when we arrived at the park, pointing to one rides frame and curve in the twilight.īut the inspiration is also conceptual. 30 at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art for an 18-month run, has a coaster theme and a spectacular centerpiece: a working coaster inside the museum for visitors to ride.Īs a form, coasters give Hill visual pleasure. ∻rake Run Helix, his exhibition opening Oct. Theyre a recurring motif in his performance art, photography, painting and sculpture. ∼ertain ideas can be communicated via language and land really well other things, you have to feel in your gut.Ĭoasters arent just a hobby for Hill. The excursions real point: There are things that I believe you have to feel to understand, Hill said. I was thinking, if this thing goes off the rails, its us first, he said. But the front-row ride on the Green Lantern, where you stand rather than sit, heightening the sense of danger, did the job. ![]() ![]() We had come for the 45-story-high Kingda Ka, billed as the worlds tallest, but it was down for maintenance. ∿or your first coaster, that was a bold start, Hill said as we devoured fried food once our stomachs resumed normal service. ![]() He loves wooden coasters of yore and high-tech insanities like the X2, with seats out on wings that flip you over and over as you go. He knows an in-line twist from a heartline roll. Coaster toys littered his childhood bedroom in South Central Los Angeles. It was a Friday night in central New Jersey, and artist EJ Hill had me doing high-speed upside-down corkscrews as we rode the Green Lantern, a somewhat demonic roller coaster at Six Flags Great Adventure that seems designed to reshuffle your organs.įor me, in deep middle age, this was my first roller coaster.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |