O, Stone, BE NOT SO

O, Stone, Be Not So explores the two dueling identities of North Adams. 

The two large maps tell the story of the history of manufacturing and industry in this small city, and how this rich history paved the way for the rise of a new economic engine, art tourism. The relatively new presence of the art community is contributing to a new character and sense of place for North Adams, but has led to a split identity. This installation explores this rich history through the process of “mapping” the complex patterns of human activity over time.

The first economic boom in North Adams began with the marble quarry at what is now Natural Bridge State Park. The stunning marble bridge is made of 550 million year-old bedrock marble, carved into its iconic arch after the last Ice Age over 13,000 years ago, by the forces of glacial melting water.

Volumes shape voids. Form gives presence to the void which would otherwise remain unseen. O, Stone, Be Not So explores the nature of coexisting realities by loosely forming the shape the negative space between the colossal marble rock formations at Natural Bridge. In the gallery, the void between the marble walls is memorialized in its opposite form – not as white, heavy and dense, but black, lightweight and airy. 

This tension is also explored in the title O, Stone, Be Not So, a palindrome in which the same series of letters appear both forward and backward. Can we ask a stone to no longer be a stone? By inverting the stark dualism of negative space into a positive shape, this installation invites visitors to question seemingly contrary forces; density and lightness, presence and absence, certainty and uncertainty, and to examine the nearly universal desire to change that which we deem opposite, those who are opposing.