Settle
04 June – 31 July 2011
This installation uses sculpture and vertical gardening techniques to explore ideas of neighbourhood, community and place from the perspective of a recent university graduate.
Scarlet runner beans were planted in and around human-sized wire figures, which were poised to suggest movement or flight. Embedding them in a garden, a place which evokes home and a sense of security and grounded-ness, created a tension between the figures on the move, and the plants pulling them back. As the beans grow over the sculptures the figures became part of the garden landscape.
The work functions as a metaphor for the pressures young people feel to be part of an urban environment, constantly on the move, seeking career opportunities, building networks while simultaneously committing to a direction, settling down and identifying with a particular place.
Katie Strang graduated from the Queen’s University Fine Art Program in 2011. She is interested in sculpture, print making, installation and gardening. She is currently preoccupied with the way we occupy our environments, both in the way we take up space and move, and the tension between our physical existence and our conception of it.