DARREN LEE MILLER
Exercises in Empathy
I invite people of all ages to share their insecurities, anxieties, and strengths, without fear of judgment. Using ordinary objects and our own bodies we create totems or perform new rituals for the camera, to help us venture into a shared dream space. Sometimes we appear together in the images, and other times one of us is seen alone. We make empathic connections with one another, and by extension with the viewer. Sexuality, fantasy, desire, and decorum inform the recorded interactions. The resulting works depict moments that are at once seductive and repulsive, both familiar and strange. My collaborators are named in the titles of the images, and I am grateful for their willingness to confide in me and trust the process.
This is How I Know I'm Here, collaboration with Stephanie Dowda
Archival Inkjet Print
20 x 24 inches, edition of 5 + 2 AP
CLICK HERE TO SEE WORK BY STEPHANIE DOWDA
It's Under Control, collaboration with Audrey Ryan
CLICK HERE TO SEE WORK BY AUDREY RYAN
Reading, collaboration with Hugh Coyle
CLICK HERE TO SEE WORK BY HUGH COYLE
Fecundity, collaboration with Molly Aubry
CLICK HERE TO SEE WORK BY MOLLY AUBRY
Unlucky, collaboration with John Provost
CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT JOHN'S WORK
Creation, collaboration with David Morris
CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT DAVID'S WORK
Second Thoughts, collaboration with Timothy Huang
CLICK HERE TO SEE WORK BY TIMOTHY HUANG
What It Means, collaboration with Leslie Sills
Video, 0:52 seconds, (CLICK HERE TO VIEW VIDEO)
2018/ongoing
CLICK HERE TO SEE WORK BY LESLIE SILLS
I Dreamt We Were in a Boat, collaboration with Colleen Toledano
Archival Inkjet Prints
Diptych, 20 x 24 inches each, edition of 5 + 2 AP
CLICK HERE TO SEE WORK BY COLLEEN TOLEDANO
Retold
We tell the same stories over and over, repurposing the players to create new meaning but often the older associations remain close to the surface. Taking my cues from metaphors and symbols seen in ancient mythology, renaissance painting, TV commercials, drag performances, and contemporary politics, I undermine the power dynamics and roles that exist within depicted relationships to remind the viewer of familiar stories, but also to challenge expected meaning.
Fujichrome transparencies in light boxes
Triptych, 4 x 5 inches each
Fauntleroy
The Model Homeowner
16 x 36 inches approx., edition of 5 + 2 AP
Seeking Comfort
Drake Well
For this project, I had four days of nearly unlimited access to the Drake Well Museum and Park, a celebration of the history of petroleum managed by the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission. I researched and reflected upon events that occurred in the places represented by the various displays, and then I documented the performative interventions I staged there to queer the spaces and complicate the triumphant narrative of oil told in many of the permanent exhibitions. Four of the five images were acquired by the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission and are now on display at the Drake Well Museum with the accompanying captions, included in this portfolio.
In Invocation, the artist depicts himself as Pandora, the first human woman created by the gods at the behest of Zeus. Just as Pandora opened a container releasing all the evils of humanity, the figure in this photograph operates a machine to raise oil out of the ground. Is it an elixir or a curse? The Pandora myth is a theodicy, an attempt to answer the question of why a good god would permit evil.
Nostrum
Nostrum shows the artist standing on the edge of a creek drinking oil, with a large Standard Drilling Rig in the background. Oil has transformed human life in almost every aspect, but what effect would literally drinking it have on a body? Petroleum is acknowledged as both miraculous and poisonous, challenging us to examine the effects the oil industry has had on our health, the soil, air, and waterways.
Fractured Fairytale (Work)
Fractured Fairytale (Work) shows a contemporary oilfield worker, a very different figure from the 19th century oil baron portrayed in "A Vision." At the time this image was created, the oil industry was in the middle of a boom, rapidly creating new jobs in the Dakotas and other areas around the country. While many of the jobs offer a high rate of pay, the work is dangerous, lonely, and contingent upon wild market swings. Whole towns, like Pithole, PA, may spring up seemingly overnight only to be abandoned months or years later, when the market – or the well – dries up.
In A Vision, a robber baron is momentarily entranced by visions of his wealth, even though his fortune is built upon a shell game called, externalization. Since producers of petroleum are not liable to pay the current and future costs of climate change and aquifer contamination, these do not contribute to their costs. The price of a tank of fuel doesn't include the cost of the wars fought to secure it, highway construction and maintenance, and the clean up of oil spills and microplastic pollution. Because of externalization, fossil fuels are ubiquitous and relatively cheap. Oil, natural gas, and coal power our transportation systems, electrical grids, and factories. The owners get rich, and we all pay the price.
Over a Barrel
Over a Barrel shows the 19th century oil baron portrayed in "A Vision" after he's lost everything. Humanity stands to lose a lot more than just our shirts as our we turn earth into a greenhouse gas chamber. The effects of climate change are already obvious as the human population climbs to 8 billion. We now face the near-term threat of mass extinction thanks not only to overpopulation, but also to the grave ecological shifts created by an economic system that relies on taking hydrocarbons from underground, burning them, and releasing carbon dioxide waste into the air. We have, at our own peril, changed the chemistry of the planet's atmosphere and oceans while simultaneously farming, developing, and otherwise altering over 75% of the planet's land.
Baldwin Reynolds
In the summers of 2013 and 2014, I was Artist-in-Residence at the Baldwin Reynolds House Museum in Meadville, PA. Operated by the Crawford County Historical Society, the residencies provided nearly unrestricted access to the historical interiors and landscapes surrounding the house. I researched and reflected upon the historical events, functions, and rituals that occurred in the various rooms and grounds, and then I documented the performative interventions I staged there in order to draw connections to older, archetypal stories. I continued my explorations of hidden desire, fantasy, and power play, while creating narrative moments for the camera.
Dancing Alone
La Petit Mort
The Awkward Roommate
Everybody Talks
Places of Assignation
I explore urban and rural spaces, hidden in plain sight, where people gather to drink, use drugs, and have sex. Only those who can read the subtle signs know that these are places to go to get what they're after. In some cases, the interior spaces are personal to me, places where I once arranged surreptitious encounters. I sometimes use the diptych format to force syntactic or connotative relationships between images, projecting fantasy and queerness onto otherwise uncharged spaces.
A Safe Space
16 x 20 inches, edition of 5 +2AP
Tahawus Interior
Jeff's Memorial to Spanky
Andrew + Ken
Birmingham 1 (car wash)
Birmingham 2 (liquor store)
Diptych, 20 x 16 inches each , edition of 5 +2AP
Diptych, 20 x 16 inches each, edition of 5 +2AP
Boston (under bridges)
Silver Gelatin Prints
Diptych, 16 x 16 inches each
Exploring Upstate Arcadia
Many of my images are staged in small towns in upstate New York and Northwestern PA, in historic, wealthy homes and gendered quarters, full of the detritus of patriarchal colonialist decor: taxidermied animals, solid hardwood furniture, and precious antiques. Others show more modest homes and roadside scenes of commerce. My interest in American Vernacular grew under the mentorship of one of my graduate professors, photographer Jim Dow, and continues as I observe lifestyle choices of those who live in rural areas.
Peter's Deer
Easter Tree
Mercer Diner
Crawford County Fair
Hudson Opera House
16 x 36 inches approx., edition of 5 +2AP
Ellen and Rick's Place
Kathy's Yard
New Topography (Newcomb View)
Free Kenlin Wood
Donnie's House
Pat's Dining Room
Sporty's
Kathy's Kitchen
Cold River Ranch
Gramma's Things
Ellen and Rick's Living Room
Pat's Game Room
Peter's Dining Room
Bob's Living Room
Peter's Great Room
Blue Mountain Episcopal Church
Eagle's Nest Clubhouse
Johnny and Ellen's Living Room
Mirrored Stage
In this project, I mine layers of non-verbal social interaction by performing for the camera. Though the places shown in the images do actually exist, my work occupies a space between fiction and fact. The work is autobiographical to some degree and imaginary to another. The interior spaces reflect the inner spaces of emotion, subconscious and intimacy.
I inhabit multiple personae, playing many roles, so what at first appears to be subjective and personal also functions as cultural commentary. Familiar consumer objects and costuming paired with incongruous settings and situations hint at a desire for normalcy while undermining the very idea of what is normal.
While some of my personae wander into urban settings, their rural roots are apparent. My deep, almost romantic reverence for "nature" is a crucial tool I use to lead viewers into a world only I can see. It's an, idyllic, rustic, compulsive, gratifying world. The images sometimes provoke humiliation and fear while simultaneously eliciting pleasure and erotic joy. I often use my own body as an object of desire, placing the camera's gaze squarely on me while also focusing on our tendency to fetishize just about anything considered to be "beyond normal." The world is fraught with latent desires, compulsory roles, and social dynamics, and I feel like it's my job to expose them. It's not enough for you to be the viewer/voyeur. I work to get under your skin, and to make you laugh, even if I make you uncomfortable.
The work ranges from the simultaneously homosocial, homoerotic and homophobic, to the patriarchal and historic. Once it is clear that I appear repeatedly, I work to ensnare the viewer in a psychological space of projection, memory and identification. I am consciously using thinly-veiled, humorous allusions to sex both to uncover mainstream homoeroticism and also to undermine myths of heteronormativity.
The Lesson
In Waiting
Going Back For More
The Firemen
The Gaze
Leaf Peepers
Homosocial
Sideward Glance
Chromogenic Prints
10 x 8 inches each
I take portraits of those who identify as being part of subcultural groups (LGBT people, off-the-grid homesteaders, steam engine geeks, and collectors of all kinds) because I'm interested in how we find, form, and sustain communities.
Super Machomenos (Heriberto)
10 x 10 inches, edition of 5
After (Cait)
Dad (Jason)
Gummy Bears (Tom)
Manhunt (Lawrence)
Culling the Flock (Keegan)
Kelly, from the Sustainable Communities Interview Project
Charmaine, from the Sustainable Communities Interview Project
Alice, from the Sustainable Communities Interview Project
Dave, from the Sustainable Communities Interview Project
Patty at Work, from the Railfanning Project
Albert at Home, from the Railfanning Project
John Chasing a Train, from the Railfanning Project
Nick at Night, from the Railfanning Project
Works in this section do not fit neatly into any one category. These are experiments, and the results of playful collaborations with friends and colleagues. Further information is provided in the image captions.
It Wasn't Like This Before
Video, 7:25 minutes (CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE VIDEO)
This was a fun weekend, collaborating with colleagues and students to create this video for the 48 hour film festival at Allegheny College. We were provided with props (rainbow plastic slinky and colorful plastic balls), a line of dialogue (It wasn't like this before), and a set of parameters: http://www.48hourfilm.com/en/filmmaking-rules
Look Away, collaboration with M.G. Singer
Latex, Acrylic, and Black Powder on Canvas
CLICK HERE TO SEE CELLPHONE VIDEO
CLICK HERE TO SEE SLIDESHOW
We made a representation of the confederate flag by stenciling the stars and bars with black powder (musket propellant) on a flat black ground. We did not burn the flag, but instead we lit the powder to draw the image onto the canvas. We've been watching our neighbors in Meadville decorate their homes and cars with new confederate flags, and while some say it is about southern heritage, the history of slavery is an inextricable part of this symbol. The flag may signify rebellion against authority to some, but its display is felt as a micro-aggression by many people of color. We considered that as we made the flag black on black, because historical constructions of "blackness," of 3/5-ness, of human beings as other people's property are the reason the south declared secession. We considered the history of the civil war as we used a modern approximation of the material that was used to propel bullets on battle fields. We thought about how the recent yankee appropriation of the flag seems to be wrapped up in right-wing distrust of government regulation and declarations of allegiance to second amendment rights. We alluded to Independence Day fireworks, and the spectacle of small-scale pyrotechnics that are a part of our nationalistic celebrating. We hope to raise a lot of questions. We are not trying to silence anyone who feels they need to display this flag, but we are calling them out and demanding intellectual honesty.
A sculptural paper work I made for an exhibition with Combat Paper. By working in communities directly affected by warfare and using the uniforms and artifacts from their experiences, a transformation occurs and our collective language is born.
Artist Nathan Lewis lead veterans and other workshop participants in a week-long paper-making and bookmaking workshop. Participants will reclaim their uniforms — which were cut up, beaten into a pulp, and formed into sheets of paper — to collaboratively create works of art which were shown in conjunction with artworks made by national and international artists on sheets of combat paper.
I used my sheet of combat paper to create a sculptural representation of an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) going off at ground level. IEDs have been a significant cause of American casualties in the ongoing wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, etc.
A small, sculptural artist's book I made in 2011 for the traveling exhibition, "Made To Move." The image is taken from a profile photo on a gay social media/dating site, and is drawn with a series of holes poked into the paper.
5"x5"x5," Pierced, folded paper, board, string
Inside, a pink triangle is suspended with white cotton string.
Monoculture
Cotton T-Shirt, Floral Foam, sprouted Kentucky Bluegrass seed
A living sculpture I made for a fundraiser at Artists Image Resources (AIR) in Pittsburgh, PA. Participating artists were provided a t-shirt, and we were charged to respond to our assigned shirt in order to create a new work.
The shirt I was given was emblazoned with FFA, which stands for Future Farmers of America. I decided to grow Kentucky Bluegrass on the shirt, the one single "crop" grown more than any other in the USA, making a kind of hairshirt for an aspiring farmer.
Monoculture, detail
This still image (which can also be seen in MIRRORED STAGE, documents a durational performance I displayed at GASP Gallery in Brookline Massachusetts. A man enters from the right, carrying a clipboard with papers attached, and hands it to the man seated at the desk. The papers contain the names of American military personnel who died while serving in the current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. The man at the desk uses disappearing ink to record the names on paper tags, and then hands them off to be strung-up on the ceiling. The paperwork is shredded after the names are recorded.
4000 and Counting, installation view
I left supplies in the gallery and prompted visitors to don the coat and perform the task of transcribing, shredding, and hanging tags. I went in once a week to refresh the clipboard, transcribe, hang, shred. The names came from a website that tallied coalition casualties in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. I counted the dead American troops. I realized that no one was counting the Iraqi and Afghani casualties. As I worked on this installation I thought about who has the privilege to be counted, and whose lives seem to matter more. I thought about redaction and white washing and secrecy and cover-ups.
The seemingly interminable rows of rounded tags hanging overhead remind me of the tombstones rising from the ground at Arlington cemetery. When the show opened there were 3400 American fatalities. At the end of the exhibition I titled the piece, "4000 and Counting." Thanks to Susanne Slavick for encouraging me to submit this project to 10 Years and Counting, where it was featured in 2011.
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All works © Darren Lee Miller 2019, except where indicated otherwise