Nicholas des Cognets

2009-10 Artist-in-Residence

About the Artist:
A lifelong interest in biology and chemistry is the driving force behind Nicholas des Cognets’s artistic practice. His work focuses on slowing a viewer’s perception and fostering a kind of seeing that is rare in our mediated society. Varying times scales, iconic images of the natural world, and a kind of homespun gadgetry are all mainstays of his work. Highly influenced by his childhood in rural western Massachusetts, he went on to receive a BFA in sculpture from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. After nearly eight years living and working in Brooklyn, New York, he currently lives in Richmond Virginia were he just received his MFA in Sculpture from the Virginia Commonwealth University. He has shown his work extensively in both a solo and group shows, including recent shows in New York, Washington DC, and Los Angeles.

Project Description:
I did not produce a large singular project with my time at Sculpture Space. Instead I continued a studio practice that involves many smaller works and actions that when combined together produce my desired effect. I used the rural landscape of upstate New York as the subject for my pieces. In one project, for a series of weeks I collected wildflowers from the woods and fields outside Utica. After they were dried, the flowers were bound together and displayed in a large bouquet. In a similar collecting process, I made a cube of rammed earth from different locations in the area. These pieces are displayed with a large wall installation, titled Utica Sunset. This piece is composed of drawings of local birds, wire crystal-like forms, found objects and other elements. I also produced a series of photographs using long-exposure shots of moving LEDs. These images were shot at night and were intended to relate to the movement of starts across the sky.

Produced simultaneously with the objects above, I shot a series of three videos. I was looking to make simple, blunt, and beautiful documentations of local natural events using three different time scales. The first was a short video of sunlight shining through leaves. The second was a video of cottonwood fluff floating on the breeze. The third was long shot of the sun setting behind rolling hills.

I found my time at Sculpture Space to be focused more on experimentation than on producing finished works. I am leaving here with a number of strong ideas for more ambitious works to be created over the coming year.