Episode 45: Dameon Lester - Serene Disturbance

Author: Scott David Gordon
Published: Sat 06 Oct 2018
Episode Link: https://www.austinarttalk.com/45

"I had never been to a glacier. I had this vision of them being these giant massive things that were just there. I never really thought about how much of a living organism they are. Growing and retreating, melting, and expanding and changing. When we went on hikes on the glacier the pathway changes constantly because of the nature of the glacier and the route. With climate change these things that have been around for thousands of years are disappearing. This object I thought was a permanent structure has this really ephemeral, impermanent quality."

How would you communicate the enormity of a glacier or the complexity of global warming, with a sculpture or drawing? Would you travel to Iceland to see for yourself the scale of the issue and personally trace the many miles of ice that have been lost? Dameon Lester did just that, motivated by a desire to go beyond just looking at images on the internet. He wanted to use all of his senses and see it for himself as he crafted a body of work with the goal of communicating the issues, anxieties, denials, decisions, and inter-connectedness of us all, the planet, and the consequences of our actions related to climate change.

Completing two residencies in Iceland in the last year allowed him to explore different materials and experiment in a studio, while also exploring the ephemeral landscape of that distant place. The tactic that he chose was to pare everything down to the most simple and basic forms as a way to filter all the elements under consideration into a cohesive approach.

The current results of his work and travel, around the issue of climate change, is the exhibition Serene Disturbance, on display at grayDUCK gallery until October 28, 2018.

Some of the subjects we discuss:

Iceland residencies

Serene Disturbance

The one rock

Permanece/simplicity

James Balog’s work

Global warming

Seeing first hand

The uneasy tension

Controlling materials

Art school history

Need to make art

Working in the studio

Parameters/focus

Show title origin

Intensity/anxiety

Different materials

Tempo public art

Future plans

Images of sculptures

ICOSA group show/EAST

Adult special education

Contentment/values

Letting go/Crit group

Everything’s meaning

grayDuck