Exhibition Statement:

Since March of 2020 the physical and emotional space between each of us has widened like a deep chasm along an active fault line. Many of us are now largely alone in an echo chamber with ourselves: ungrounded and isolated. Floating. We are working from home without contact with our colleagues, our children are attending school online removed from daily interaction with their classmates, and we have severely limited if not eliminated the social gatherings with friends and family that we’ve enjoyed throughout our lives. We’ve tried to connect online, but became tired of virtual interaction. Some of us have found ourselves waving to parents and grandparents through panes of glass, pining to touch our loved ones. And despite this careful distancing, we have lost so many of our mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, sons, and daughters. Our isolation is a necessity in order to protect one another – but, it’s left a lasting impression on us. Some of us have tried to make the best of the alone time: we sipped quarantinis, attended virtual dance parties and learned to make sourdough bread or planted “victory gardens” in an attempt to find a silver lining.

As the last year passed by, small and midsize businesses closed, many permanently. “For Lease” signs populated our shop windows. Many industries such as travel and hospitality vanished, constricting cultural exchange and all but extinguishing the potential for adventure. We stayed indoors trying to find ways to occupy our time. The dream of abundant employment opportunities and the promise of engaging in a vibrant community was stolen from us – hopefully temporarily – though some of the changes we have seen will endure. Once buzzing city centers - many of which were already underutilized and in decline - have gone silent. City buildings and suburban retail centers that had long ago fallen into disrepair eerily await our return, while new sites join the process of 4 decline as constant investment is required to preserve our structures. Some of these sites have begun to show movement on the scale between the built environment and the natural world as nature begins to lay claim to them.

As we travel to these old familiar places, ducking our heads into doorways that have not been used in some time, we find that vestiges of what was abound. We have left traces of ourselves in every nook and cranny of our towns and cities. These human remnants are not dissimilar to messages in a bottle: they are clues to what came before, a voice waiting to be discovered if the recipient is open to receiving. Markings left by those who stood in the space you are standing in now are mysteries waiting to be solved. Who was here? What were they like? Where are they now? Time is all that separates us from one another in such spaces of investigation. When lost in thought in an empty reverberating room, we daydream nostalgically of lively vibrant gatherings full of smiling faces – they are so close yet so far away from us now. Sorry we missed you is an attempt to make tangible the emotional quality of the sustained isolation and economic decline that characterizes this time.

Sorry we missed you extends an open hand to the viewer and whispers “I understand how you feel, I’m feeling that way too. I miss you. I miss people. I miss people like you. I’m worried about our futures just as you are. I am right alongside you, feeling the vacancy of this moment and waiting for the day when we are together again - rebuilding.” -Lisa Dillin

Dillin statement for Ladew:
 
Through Commemoratory fixtures Dillin seeks to call forth the familiarity of silence and awaken a sense of nostalgia for discarded sites we once dutifully tended to like the gardens that surround the work. The dimly lit structures evoke vestiges of retail: of the brick and mortar sites in our communities and our home towns that have fallen silent. This work follows in the vein of the recent one-person exhibit Sorry we missed you at the Frederick Arts Council – a show that worked to make tangible the emotional quality of sustained isolation and economic decline that characterizes this time - while romantically highlighting artifacts of human presence in order to draw out awareness of the universal desire for human connection. Many thanks to Ladew Gardens for sponsoring Commemoratory fixtures.

About the Natural Lighting Emulator Series:

The Natural Lighting Emulator series is based on a specific natural lighting situation: sunlight as seen from beneath a tree canopy. Within the built environment, the opportunity to experience this “natural lighting situation” is diminishing. The cautionary NLE light works provide a thrilling surrogate for this natural phenomenon – they function as a playful solution to life in the built environment, disconnected from the natural world.

The space between (us) is an interdisciplinary performance work by visual artist/sculptor Lisa Dillin and Deep Vision Dance Company’s Artistic Director Nicole A. Martinell. The space between (us) unpacks the human experience within the built environment, which commonly evokes feelings of isolation and emotional disconnection from the banal, everyday places we move through and inhabit. Such experiences stem from a variety of factors such as design that separates us from one another and controls our movements in space, social norms that discourage interconnection with those we do not know, and the increasing level of mediated interaction that takes place through digital communication. During four performances, several sculptural objects act as a site for a weaving journey that begins in a meaningless, modern space but, coming unhinged from the norm, is remade into a place of exploration, creativity, freedom, and, ultimately, intimate human connection. A five-channel video piece represents the choreographic work following the initial performances.

Featured dancers include Deep Vision Dance Company members Deontay Gray, Samantha Hopkins, Melissa Lloyd, Sofie Massa, Rachel Moore, Sarah Smith and Ann Zickefoose. Additional collaborators include an original score by PJ Dorsey (Tarotplane) and Erik Spangler (DJ Dubble8) and costuming by Kendra Shapanus. Video production support by Erik Dillinger with Stephanie Barber, Corey Hughes, Jonna McKone, and Justin RT Stafford and 3D fabrication support by Chip Banister, Wilder Childs, and Pete Karis.

@ Hamiltonian Gallery June 27 – July 30 2015

The Aposiopesis (the ellipsis) that trails behind the meat of the exhibition title: I’m looking for you with it’s series of dots reveals a sense of longing, of something missing or the inability to finish the thought. Through this phrasing tactic I am referring to the many things that I note to be lacking as I move about the North American built environment and it’s corporate lobbies, malls, hospitals, apartment buildings and city streets. I’m looking for you community. I’m looking for you connection. I’m looking for you meaning. I’m looking for you authenticity. I’m looking for you sense of place. I’m looking for you personal ownership. I’m looking for you heritage. I’m looking for you natural landscape. I’m looking for you biological diversity. I’m looking for you other ways to put together our world.

The contemporary urban landscape with it’s corporate design tropes seeks to disempower, disengage, disorient, and control the individual as he/she navigates this terrain. Physical and psychological barriers perform crowd control by design and keep us on task and away from forming connections. Polished stone, glass, brass, patterned textiles, lighting, fountains and foliage act as a dominance display for the powerful yet they also reveal an estranged but ongoing attraction to nature revealed through a form of imitation.

Within these public and private palaces to the dominant powers controlling the ever expanding population of our species, I feel the obligatory sense of awe but more so a sense of longing and melancholy like a rat within a social experiment wishing for personal power, ownership and home. Modern survival methodologies have made achieving shelter and sustenance more convenient for the many (while making it equally or more difficult for those who do not play the game well) but these conveniences come at a cost – the cost is our connection to the land, to our food sources, to our homes and to one another. This body of work re-presents a variety of dividing lines while offering an outstretched hand through the flirtatious yet sincere statement: I’m looking for you.

Allogrooming Lounge - Hamiltonian Gallery - March 2014
Allogrooming Lounge II Transmodern Performance Art Festival September 2014

Allogrooming Lounge II is a variation of Allogrooming Lounge which was on view at Hamiltonian Gallery in Washington DC in the Spring of 2014. Allogrooming Lounge I and II compare and contrast human social interaction with that of our primate relatives in an effort to investigate our roots and the differences between our past and present modes of operation. Primates spend up to 20% of their time on social grooming practices known as allogrooming. Allogrooming allows for the formation of new bonds and ensures the maintenance of established bonds. Allogrooming is a powerful tool for reducing group tension and diffusing aggressive outbursts.

Humans have evolved to develop relations in a comparable manner. Our brains are wired to expect familiarity, connection, and cooperation with members of a small and intimate community. It was not until relatively recently that humans have joined vast communities with populations beyond that which make it possible to know all of the members of the group/community physically and in person. Due to these dramatic shifts in social norms that today’s environ requires, we are becoming increasingly physically isolated from one another and are experiencing a new pattern of touch-deprivation. Allogrooming Lounge I and II provide a time and a space to connect with one another through social grooming activities in an experiment that aims to add to the sense of local community while shedding light on contemporary human behavior.

At Gallery Four for solo exhibit titled "Stopgap" March 2013

Statement for Communal Drinking Source:
This participatory art object simulates nature, becoming a surrogate for bodies of water. The water’s edge was a meeting place for our ancestors, a place to nourish oneself, to bathe and to socialize. CDS combines the experience of socializing by the water’s edge with that of an ordinary drinking fountain, an object that is ubiquitous in the modern realm.

Statement for Primal Tan:
The applicator of the spray-tan offers a transformative experience to the participant linking them to their ancestors who spent a great deal of time outdoors increasing their melanin production. Afterwards, participants retreat to a lounge allowing for the formation of temporal communities.

About the Natural Lighting Emulator Series:

The Natural Lighting Emulator series is based on a specific natural lighting situation: sunlight as seen from beneath a tree canopy. Within the built environment, the opportunity to experience this “natural lighting situation” is diminishing. The cautionary NLE light works provide a thrilling surrogate for this natural phenomenon – they function as a playful solution to life in the built environment, disconnected from the natural world.

About the Equivalent Formations Series:

Works within the Equivalent Formations series act as a stand-in for natural forms such as rocky outcrops and plant life. These man-made, often rectilinear, imposters hold the place for natural ephemera, marking the site as a reminder of the past while performing roles reflective of the contemporary human-dominated landscape.

The "Window" series explores ideas of inside vs outside, the outside bearing connections to nature as in "the great outdoors", the inside as a space that seperates us from the exterior and inevitably from one another. The widow is the line that divides these two worlds. However, when one passes through the window into the outside this realm is likely to mirror the interior in that it is designed, controlled and unwild with little trace of nature. The window then becomes a mirror, our image is projected into both worlds pointing to a problematic and philosophical search for nature. Where then is the dividing line between the built environment and the natural world?