| TEX JERNIGAN: POOL | |||
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 is designed to assist, explain, and detail my latest project, a tour of a piece workingly titled, "Pool." The project is in the early planning stages, and as it grows and dates are set and dates are met, so the site will grow. Further inquiry should be directed to myself, Tex Jernigan. To explore other works, you can go to the main page. I will have a printable pdf version of this when it's better fleshed out / trimmed down; until then, just hit print. |
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| ABOUT PLAN ASSIST SCHEDULE CONTACT | ||||
Pool is a work which takes aspects of my previous work with perspective, but imbues it with with a renewed sense of color, landscape, and temporality. In taking it across the country, and allowing the work itself to be influenced by community and place, I'm hoping to create a larger portrait, of both diversity and homogeneity. Pool is essentially a reflecting pool, not unlike Washington Memorial or the pool which leads to the Taj Mahal. But by shaping the perimeter of the pool to create an ovoid shape from a fixed perspective, the pool becomes its own form, an infinity pond, a liquid vanity mirror which reflects and frames the human form. Below is one of my early tests. I thought I could get a quick test for the piece by walling the perimeter with clay, right on the surface of the road. The sun bakes that clay pretty quick so it was cracking about 15 minutes after I layed it.  I learned alot from this one. You can see how stunning the gradient will look from its orange sunset at the top, to the deep blue at Robert's feet. You can also see how stunningly clear the reflection is. You can't really see Robert, but I'm working that issue out. One valuable lesson I learned from this, on the positive side of things, is that the center of the road is a perfect location to install in. The slope on either side of the center of the road means that water pools to the edges, and the center will remain the most shallow point, so people can stand in the center without treading water. Sky's the limit with the range of possibilities we choose to reflect. An overcast day yields a bright white reflection, a sunest yields a sunset, albeit up-side down. But I can also reflect greenery, architecture, even a ceiling. Imagine a glass skyskraper reflecting the blue skies all reflecting in my pool. Each install becomes a portrait not only of the passerbys and participants, but of the locale itself.  A photograph of the Taj Majal at dawn. |
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| PLAN BACK TO TOP | ||||
The construction of the pool rides on early successes with a material called cross-linked polyethylene, a rubbery black medium density foam. The floor of the pool is black, which provides the illusion of depth and increases the reflective qualities, much like reflecting pool leading to the Taj Majal (pictured above); the material lining the bottom of that pool is black marble. For each location, I plan to have insurance for general liability, shoot pictures of people inside of the pool, have them sign model releases, post their pictures online; last time I also offered polaroids for those who wanted immediacy or lacked the internet. The day of the event, I will arrive and be setting up by early afternoon. The piece will unroll pretty much right into the spot, so filling the pool is where the most work is. I'm thinking that I'll stock 200 feet of hose to make things easier. |
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| ASSIST BACK TO TOP | ||||
This section will detail the kinds of support that are needed for each locale. I'll get straight to it. Funding The minimum level of financial support that I require for each location at $250. Whether your institution can provide this money is not the issue; I'm simply spreading the total estimated cost for this project among the thirty some-odd locales I stop in. I'm also simply taking the ball out of my park and putting it in yours. This is an opportunity to bring something potentially spectacular to an audience who is unprepared for such a thing. This amount will certainly get this project rolling, but I'm hoping we can double it. Promotion / Press To get people to come out to something like this sometimes requires a little bit of work. I would like to have a good amount of press using whatever media best suits each location. For instance, in small towns or in certain areas, local televised news press works ok -- it's immediate, and it works with my timeframe: I plan to be installing for each location by early afternoon, and so there's the potential for five o'clock news to work pretty well. I'd like to get something in that morning's paper, and I'm up for doing radio talks, artist talks, and the like. Event Planning In some cities, some towns, I would like to further the piece's event-ness. This is one of the key places I'm hoping public art programs will step in. I like to envision people milling about on either side and around the pool, drinking wine or beer, eating hors d'oeuvre, whatever; I leave this to you, and I highly encourage it. If your organization wants to plan a gala event, an arts festival, a car show, a sidewalk chalk afternoon, a community block party -- these all sound great. Groundwork This is perhaps the integral part of making this project economical - If I can get a local from each town to pick out a site for me to install, I would save myself a month-long trip across the country and several hundred dollars in gas. Problem is, picking out a site is not the easiest: it requires a 50 foot strip of fairly level ground, and a consciousness for what the pool will reflect. I have a few ideas for how to solve this hurdle: one; contact city survey offices and determine a selection of level locations, two; contact surveying contractors and hope that one would be able to donate some time and determine a few level sites, and three; provided that one of these options works, take a look at these predetermined locations, and make a judgement call. This judgement call would be assisted with a video tutorial where I outline a few considerations, such as geographical orientation, which determines what kind of sky will be reflected, and a method to determine whether powerlines, streetlights, and other interferences in the general horizon will show up in the reflection. Legal Getting the site picked out and passed through the city offices typically requires an application and a small fee. Pushing this through the city is something I'd like to not have to deal with. I'm insuring myself for general liability, but I've found in previous installations that organizations prefer to additionally insure. |
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| SCHEDULE BACK TO TOP | ||||
I'm just going to lay out a general one: I'm making a trip out to New York and back July 7th - July 14, to line up part of the second leg of my tour, connecting with public art programs in St. Louis, Indianapolis, Cleveland, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Philly, Boston (maybe), and New York. I need to make a similar trip in the early fall, late summer to secure the rest of the tour, but this New York trip was kind of last minute. So here are the towns on the list, and I'll keep it general, and pretty much in order.
There may be more or less locations as time goes by, but this is a pretty full list of cities and towns for me to go off as I begin to plan this out. If you see that I'm missing a town, whether I'm literally missing one, or you see an opportunity that I shouldn't miss, I would love to know.  This is a little piece of inspiration for me, I don't know who it is or where it came from. |
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For those of you who are scratching your heads, maybe this will help. Below is a piece I created last year which, if you haven't seen any work involving perspective, should enlighten you to some of the ways in which this process works. The piece below is made of conduit, painted black and inserted into the earth, and the yellow tones which fill the facets are petals plucked from the surrounding prairie.  This photo below is the same piece, but from a different angle.  Topaz, 2007 That's Dominique in the middle, you'll probably meet her. You can see more of Tex's art projects here. |
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2734 Charlotte St., Studio 1N Kansas City, MO 64109 texjer@gmail.com 214.356.1985 Download Resume |
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