SELECT RESIDENCY

Kate Weigel is the spring 2015 resident for the NYC Select Art Fair. She will be spending the weeks of the residency in Industry City designing and building DIY lifeboats for escaping New York in a natural disaster out of found objects, garbage and...

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Show's over! Take it all down!!! Wall text be no more!!!!!! #deinstall

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Art or not art? #SelectArtFair #areyouselect #greenlight

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Amazing turn out for the VIP Opening last night! There were some incredible performances and I actually got to wear real clothing instead of studio rags for once! I am so grateful to be able to be a part of this creative and innovative fair. The fair is open every day with varying hours until Sunday night!

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That one time I was actually kind of legitimate and at an art fair. Wow. Thanks for all the help and support everyone!!!! Especially @whoismaryboo :)

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Second day of install for the fair! Working on some frames for my documentation photos right now.

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The boats have been tested and the water is cruel.

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We are testing the life rafts and making video documentation today! Hope these paddles hold up!

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Sneak peak of what I've been working on in the studio!

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So this is what happens when you cut styrofoam with a saw....

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Today I learned that if you absolutely have to get something somewhere on your bike, there is always a way. I'd like to personally thank ratchet straps for their contribution to my success. This baby is gonna make a great little canoe!

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Things you may find while dumpster diving: lots and lots and lots of bread.

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There are many different types of fasteners that I’m attempting to use on this project, but rope is definitely on the top of the list. For one, rope can be used to fasten almost any two types of materials and does not require electrical power in order to work, the way is necessary when using a drill or an impact driver. It is also a lot better than tape because it retains it’s strength of attachment even when submerged. The easiest thing to do when building your life boat would be to simply find some rope or string that is strong enough to hold it all together. But I recognize that rope isn’t always the easiest thing to find, so I’ve been experimenting with making rope out of strips of garbage bags. I’ve found that you can cut a garbage bag into one long black spiral, the thickness of which will determine the strength of your rope. I tie a loose not with two of these strips to something solid so they don’t unbraid themselves (I just tacked a screw into the wall). I twist both strips individually in the same direction and then twist them around each other in the opposite direction. This creates a dynamic friction that allows the bags to be coiled into a lightweight rope. The twisting takes quite awhile and you can only get about 12 feet out of two bags, so using regular rope is still probably your best option. However this method has lots of practical applications and can be applied to other materials as well: fabric, canvas, tarp, plastic sheeting, etc.

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From tonight’s ride! How ironic to find this beautiful Little Tykes boat while I’m out looking for anything that will float. I would have taken it too, had there not been a leak in the bottom.

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Today I set out on my bike, as I do most days now, in search of useful discarded objects for raft-making and ventured to a part of the city I have never seen before. I have so far been focusing my trashpicking to the areas north of Industry City: South Slope, Park Slope and Gowanus. I started out on my usual routes with high expectations because May 1st had just passed. I was hoping that because most leases end/begin on the first of the month, there would be more potential materials that people didn’t want to move with and thus threw away. I’ve had success finding furniture more my own apartment that way in the past, especially in more expensive neighborhoods. In any case, I was a bit disappointed, because though I was able to scope some stuff to pick up in the future, there wasn’t much on the sidewalk because city garbage doesn’t pick up on Sunday. Should have seen that one coming…

So instead I made my way south of my studio to the even more industrial parts of the waterfront. I took some random turns, enjoying the sunshine and ended up at an abandoned warehouse on the water. I scoped out some pretty interesting finds and admired some high quality graffiti, engaging in a little healthy urban exploration. I decided not to try and take too much seeing as it was the middle of the day and the police presence was high in that area, but it was amazing to see just how much trash had accumulated down by the water. I can only imagine what this area looked like during and after Superstorm Sandy. It is amazing how much consumption is continuously happening in this city. Ten thousand TONS of residential waste alone are generated in New York every single day. It is a miracle that we haven’t all been crushed by towering piles of garbage up until this point. Mayor DeBlasio has just released a plan to address some of the glaring issues with the way trash is processed, but ultimately, as much as we can hope to divert organic waste and recyclables from landfills, there will be no real long term solution until New Yorkers (and indeed Americans) learn to reduce their overall consumption. Let’s all take a leaf out of this woman’s book.

I also took a little spin around Bush Terminal Park and while I didn’t find anything useful for raft making, I did see some nice little spots that might be good for testing the craft(s) once they are done. It’s a nice picnicky place down there, lots of families enjoying a great view of Lower Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty. Check it out if you are in the area!

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Dismantling old artworks to make room for new ones #springcleaning #nofilter

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The beautiful blank canvas of a studio I'm moving into today!

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My name is Kate Weigel and I’d like to introduce myself as Select Art Fair Resident for spring 2015. I am a multimedia sculptor/performance artist based in Brooklyn. The work I make is often concerned with time, technology, and human connection and fragility. I’m originally from Maine but have lived in New York for 5 years now and have found it as inspiring as it is difficult.

After Superstorm Sandy, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about different types of apocalypses and how they could effect New York City. Ask any of my friends and they will probably tell you that I have at one time or another asked them what their “plan” is for when the end is nigh and they need to escape New York. There are over two and a half million people living in Brooklyn alone- what are they going to do in a serious evacuation situation? Take to the bridges? The subway tunnels? Fly? How can we all leave this collection of islands at the same time? Over and over again I have settled on the reality that to leave the city when there are precious few means of escape, I would need to build a boat. I will be spending my time for the next month in Industry City doing just that: building boats for the apocalypse made out of whatever I can find. I hope to have a couple different designs by the end of this experience and to be able to publish my findings for the personal use of other New Yorkers. After all, who wouldn’t love to be able to build their own DIY life raft??? I should be moving into my studio soon, meanwhile, check out my work at www.kateweigel.com!