New Artist Statement: Includes Shared Urban Spaces Project

Joel Mertz
bfa statement

Above me, below me and to either side were lights. Lights of all colors, flashing sporadically, seductively, each with their own sense of urgency. Neon lights that grew from the sides of buildings as if they were alive, and they consumed entire structures whole. There was no end in sight to this limitless symphony of color and chaos. I shared this experience with more than a million other people, who made the landscape even more surreal and overwhelming. This was my first experience in a major metropolis. I was walking along Nanjing Road in Shanghai, China when this barrage of intense visual stimulus engulfed me. Nanjing Road is known as the busiest street in the world.
This excitement, the movement, and the perpetual energy of urban spaces have always inspired me. There is a feeling of endless activity to an urban space that compels me to explore and ultimately become a part of its processes. Quite literally, I have explored the urban space for years using cameras. My goal on these outings has always been the same: to capture and identify the smaller elements that make a city what it is.
For all city inhabitants, the idea of what a city is can very greatly from person to person. Some have great pride in their city, while others see only trash, pollution and increasing environmental concerns. Obviously, our outlooks on urban living are not quite so narrow. Even the simple and mundane elements of a city, from the pigeons in a street to the small marks etched into a public bench, all have some kind of impact on how we view and understand our urban landscapes. There are certain elements however, that are inherent in all of our cities. These are the elements we all recognize and see nearly everyday. These are the elements that connect us.
The goal of my terminal project is to create an image of a city that everyone can relate to in some way. In order to achieve this, I am creating conversation about the smaller elements in our cities that we oftentimes overlook, using an online-based project entitled, “Shared Urban Spaces” (SUS). http://joelmertz.net/sus.htm This global project invites people to examine their own urban environments through ten different photography-based assignments. Photographs are submitted to the project online where they are organized and displayed in onlnine galleries.
Individually, each photography assignment functions with its own unique purpose. Assignment no. 1 for instance, asks participants to take a picture of a security camera from their city. With this assignment I was trying to make people more aware of how often they are being watched, without perhaps even realizing it. The images from all ten assignments together however, serve a much different purpose. Together, these create an image of a city, one many people can recognize. Currently, the Shared Urban Spaces Project has over 600 submitted photographs and nearly 200 members. The finalized plan for displaying the collection of these photographs is to align them into a single row that will span around the gallery.
As a supplement to this project, I have created my own fantasy urban landscape based on photographs from the SUS Project, my personal photographs, and my own imagination. This fantasy city is a 12’ x 4’ drawing that attempts to convey the energy and commotion common in any major metropolis. The landscape is comprised of hundreds of colors and includes even the smallest details, like those examined in the SUS Project. The final installation of this drawing will utilize removable self-adhesive paper. After printing onto this paper, unique and unrefined shapes will be cut. Finally, these shapes will be collaged directly onto the gallery wall using the self-adhesive property of the paper. This technique is similar to the manner in which posters and fliers are plastered onto walls around the city. An additional time based element may be included with this mural.