There are some important parallels between the sculptural works of Susy Oliveira and Brandon Vickerd, and the Marxist critique of capitalism levelled by Nicole Shukin in Rendering’s Modern Logics.
Shukin calls into question the “closed loops” provided by the capitalist model, challenging the way in which we valorize recycling as redemptive and subversive. Analogous to rendering in the meat processing industry, Shukin argues that our mythologies surrounding the recycling industry and its ability to reuse waste “arguably supplements the wasteful hyper–production and consumption of commodities with an ecological ethic of material efficiency and waste recovery that surreptitiously supports the sustainability of capitalism” (70). Rather than calling into question the inherent wastefulness of industrialization (and by analogy, meat processing), recycling and rendering serve to reinforce the “hegemony of capital” by providing a “solution”. Through more efficient recycling, capitalism argues, waste can be reduced and reused and the detrimental effects of mass production mitigated or eliminated.
By providing a closed loop in which waste materials are returned to their “proper place”, “the place where they regenerate as capital” (71), capitalism provides a fake ecology reminiscent of the natural world. Though recycling in capitalism mirrors the cycling of materials in ecosystems, Shukin intelligently points to the way in which profit is suspiciously absent from the equation.
The way in which Susy Oliveira’s polygonal sculptures of natural objects and settings force the viewer to reconsider perception and representations of “the natural” in our society, is reminiscent to me of the core of Shukin’s critique. Shukin argues that appearances aside, there is very little natural about the closed loop provided by capitalism. I would argue that in calling into question what appears natural by way of the illusory effect of the concave head (Have Everything and Die), Susy Oliveira challenges the viewer to be more cognisant of models and narratives claiming naturalness. Likewise, Brandon Vickerd’s sculptural work as a whole seems to embody this critique. Immediate appearances aside, how natural is Phillips’s Park Tree, Bionic Forest, or Root System? In truth, Vickerd seems particularly interested in manufactured replications of the natural, and his work forces the viewer to consider some of the ways these false ecologies are manifest in our society. Even Satellite, though hardly depicting nature or the natural, consciously calls into question our collective capacity for myth creation.
Arguably, it’s a theme shared by other artists of the 2009 CAFK+A biennial. David Diviney’s Lodge, is a particularly good example. Outwardly resembling a beaver dam in the Kitchener bus station fountain, the dam is conspicuously covering a pile of Styrofoam coolers. Again, this is an example of art calling into question manufactured reproductions of natural elements, hinting specifically at the hidden failings of such representations. David himself suggests that his art examines the “pastoral vernacular of folklore, pioneer tales, foundational myths, and other backwoods constructs–outsider art forms, do-it-yourself aesthetics and related activities” (Diviney). This concentration on foundational myth, arguably evident as well in the work of Oliveira and Vickerd, directly connects all three artists to Shukin’s Marxist critique.
Source: Shukin, Nicole. Animal Capital: Rendering Life in Biopolitical Times. U Minnesota Press, 2009.
