August Ventimiglia

Transgraduator: or in the belly of a whale, 2001
August Ventimiglia, Williamstown, MA

August Ventimiglia constructs
Transgraduator: or in the belly of a whale

Child or adult, we can enter this sculpture on our hands and knees through a small, round, orange door. Then we can stand up, almost, and move through a cavity that gets bigger, before exiting through a much larger round, orange, door on the other side. Or, we can enter through the large door first and then bend down, then kneel down to a crawl, in order to squeeze our way through and out the smaller door. Two sides of the same sculpture. One half the size of the other. Our sense of scale is altered upon entry into this tunnel-like structure, which diminishes or increases in size depending very literally on our perspective once inside. Doors usually tell us a great deal about what lies behind them, but the two doors in this sculpture playfully manipulate our sense of the space beyond their frames.

Artist’s Comments
As in many childrenís stories, such as Alice in Wonderland, The Secret Garden, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and even Pinocchio, the threshold plays a major part in defining in and out, active and passive, and even the real and the imaginary. In these stories, as in this work, we experience shifts in scale and perspective, portals leading to undiscovered places, secret spaces, and spaces we are unlikely to return to again (the belly of a whale). The transgraduator, a mechanism for shifting form, perspective, and scale, is a portal from here to your imagination. All doors lead somewhere. When we cross over a threshold, whether it is real or imaginary, we enter a new space embodying unique experiences and rules. We simultaneously are transformed by the meanings we attribute to these spaces and create new meanings based on our past and present experience. Still, a point of entry, a catalyst, a door is necessary to cross over.

Opening the window to see what's
inside, behind this round door