Private Public Space (2010)
vinyl lettering on wall
dimensions variable
part of Decorating Loos group exhibition At the Vanishing Point - Contemporary Art curated by Georgina Pollard
based on Ornament and Crime (1908) by Adolf Loos
At once a private and public space, the toilet cubicle allows its inhabitant seclusion and its derived freedom to express biological urges as well as the urge for self-expression. This expression then in turn receives an audience. This work compares the body and the cubicle as sites for this expression, concealment and disguise from the true self.
In part an acknowledgement of Adolf Loos’ theory that decoration is deceitful, and in part contradictory, recognising the validity of self-expression. The toilet serves as a site to disguise our urges, while at the same time undergoing a decoration that distracts us from its purpose as concealment to our biology. The text is simultaneously a decoration and candid reflection of the stall’s purpose.
