ONE SHOT

The origin of the site-specific, solo exhibition ONE SHOT is an investigation into a image sourced from the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation entitled All Female Survey Crew taken in 1918, during the works for the Mindoka infrastructure Project in Idaho.

The Picture seems to be the only one available that documents a completely female survey crew until the 1950s.

Photograph courtesy of the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation

Introducing Helen, Elizabeth, Esther, and Anna, the women of the All Female Survey Crew photographed in 1918 during the Minidoka Infrastructure Project. Their newly formed identities and recalculated life stories are made available by archeologist, historian, editor, narrator artist Irina Novarese in ONE SHOT, an exhibition of ‚real facts and real fictions.‘

A month spent uncovering identities, negotiating with archivists, and being on location in Minidoka, left Novarese swimming in a sea of newspaper articles, images, and relics of a time passed. Her own impressions of times then combined with her research now brought Novarese to a point of incarnation; standing where they stood in the field surveying the land. The Boise public had a lot to say about the piles of references Novarese presented them on women’s role in society and local political history. Through a puzzling together of the numerous and varied blocks of history and association the legends of women have been reborn. Their voices, in a numerical perpetual canon have returned to the field where they were captured on film 100 years ago. (Kristen Cooper – MING Studios)

HD Video – 10min – Stereo
To watch the video please use the psw: oneshot

The project was kindly supported by:
MING STUDIOS – Contemporary Art Center & international Residency Program, Boise Idaho
BOISE CITY DEPT OF ART and HISTORY
IDAHO STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY

Multimedia installation * 2017
artist’s book (edition 100, signed)
neon sign circa 120 x 50 cm
old survey’s instruments – tripod and lens
painted survey’s measurement sticks on wood circa 300 x 5 x 1,5 cm
archive’s photo and archive’s photos prints in different dimensions.

PHOTOS Uli Westphal