Raw and precise, here's an archived, live performance by a bunch of carefully chosen things, plus physics - Fischli/Weiss's 1989 Der Lauf der Dinge, or The State of Things (9:55)

I love the gritty greys of the concrete, metal and and sludgy chemicals.

I love the hisses, gurgles and clangs of the sound recording.

And I love how the objects behave like actors set in motion, destined to play their roles but capable at any moment, with a slip of chance and physics, of causing a completely different outcome.

Physics wins.

BOOM! Why is it satisfying like nothing else watching everyday things roll, crash, fly, spin and explode?

Something to do with order and chaos...

With my giant ball of red thread at Project: Space Available

Okay, and some pushpins. Cats might not be so good with those. Well, except when you knock them over like I did last night and they go scattering all over the concrete floor.

My newest project, a collaboration with Seattle dance troupe, UMAMI Performance, has begun, and if you can't tell, I'm excited.

I also know I'm in for hours of running up and down a ladder, my default sport.

The work is called Constellation Half-Remembered, and the theme is memory. The shows will take place in several locations throughout the summer, with the first two on May 24 and 25 at Project: Space Available on Seattle's Capitol Hill, which is where I'm currently creating this installation.

It's a challenge and a genuine thrill to be collaborating with these talented dancers, choreographers,  musicians, lighting designers and a video artists. I enjoy the intersection of all of these disciplines with visual art in a big way and it's exciting to find out what we create together.

On a personal note, the opportunity to affect a three-dimensional space feels to me like a natural outgrowth of painting. Given my current preoccupation with space and the universe, the association with stars is serindipitous. All of three of my ongoing projects right now seem to be flowing into one another around the themes of space, technology and trash.

Did I mention we artists get paid to do this? Thanks to UMAMI's supersmart and resourceful Aiko Kinoshita and Aaron Swartzman and their energetic and successful fundraising drive for the project late last year, called Precursor, each of the collaborators gets paid to make our art.

Keep an eye on the red thread, it has a mind of its own...I'll be posting more here as the piece evolves.

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Constellation Half-Remembered

May 24 at 7:30pm
May 25 at 4:00pm

Project: Space Available

In the Heart of Capitol Hill's Pike/Pine Corridor, behind Neumo's Seattle, Washington

UMAMI Performance