Thomas Houseago's MOUN ROOM to Be Displayed in NYC, 11/10

About 'Moun Room'

Measuring approximately 37 feet by 45 feet wide, and 12 feet tall, 'Moun Room' is comprised of three chambers contained within one another. It retains the rough-hewn handmade quality that characterizes Houseago's oeuvre. In early 2014, the artist conceived and built the first room and inner chamber of this work. During subsequent travels in Asia, where he visited the temples of Angkor Wat in Cambodia and the Silver and Golden Pavilions of Kyoto, Japan, his vision for 'Moun Room' evolved. The proportions and layout of his chambers distantly recall those of ancient temples, and the spaces that Houseago has conceived - extending both within and outside of his structure's physical walls - invite meditation upon movement and codes of behavior in response to architecture.

Hewing to traditions of low-grade sculptural construction, the walls of 'Moun Room' are built from individual panels made of TUF-CAL plaster and are linked together through the use of iron re- bar. The architectural ribbing of the backsides of these panels reveals that the structure's internal 'bones' are akin to the ribs of the human body. But Houseago has reversed expected anatomy so that what is normally concealed and protected is externally exposed. Similarly, the soft, smooth skin of his structure's pearlescent walls can only be experienced from within 'Moun Room'.

Playing with notions of negative and positive, solid and void, geometric shapes are cut from the panel walls and constructed in bas-relief, mimicking the lunar phase of the moon. This circular motif, evocative here of mystical celestial medallions, has periodically recurred throughout Houseago's oeuvre. In Moun Room the artist has created apertures of varying sizes - some large enough to walk through and others like small portholes - and uses them to engage the viewer in exploration and play. He bisects and reframes the viewer's understanding of movement and space as the body moves around and through the work, peers out from within it.

In many ways, Houseago's 'Moun Room' is a series of cracks, fractures, and planes. Its nuanced surfaces of delicate angles and accentuations have ruptured from the act of layering plaster on plaster. The subtle differences among each panel and chamber evoke a sense of rhythm and movement. The method by which Houseago achieves these visual effects has evolved over a period of nearly ten years, derived from the artist's deep commitment to process and materials. Working with the simplicity and rawness of plaster or clay, Houseago's overall body of work has long emphasized the performative act of sculpture manifested into a literal process of looking, thinking, and perceiving.

Likewise, the creation of 'Moun Room' has so fully consumed Houseago's artistic practice over the course of this last year, that its development has become a ritualized part of daily studio life. 'I've always dreamed of building an environment for showing my sculptures', the artist has said. 'I loved the idea of the museum... but wanted to reclaim it as an artistic domain'. In this sense, 'Moun Room' has come to assume the notion of a 'maison cubiste' for the artist, transpiring into a room of repose whose making has tuned his emotional compass art toward a new direction and broader possibilities. Embracing a sculptural practice that seeks to activate the viewer more fully, 'Moun Room' circles back to Houseago's early encounters with performance art, which influenced much of his practice while he was at art school in Leeds, England.