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"Mesocosm" curated by Jasmin Lim

The mesocosm is the realm that we, as humans, are able to perceive with our senses. From our perspective, we are in the meso, the middle. The human scale appears to be between the outermost micro and macro scales—from subatomic particles like quarks and neutrinos to the universe or multiverse. While orienting from this position, we also create and use tools, both material and imagined, experiential and theoretical, to access scales many orders of magnitude smaller and larger.

How do we construct conceptions of the world around us? Adult consciousness tends to be focused like a spotlight, automatically making assumptions about the periphery and filling in the blanks. As a species thought to be capable of complex self-awareness, long-term planning and the ability to override impulses, why is it useful to understand perceptual processes that are normally subconscious? In some ways, impulse control plays a large role in the evolution of our species, of being able to consciously shape the world around us, but many of our day-to-day activities occur on autopilot. In the Rebecca Solnit essay, "Woolf’s Darkness: Embracing the Inexplicable,” she advises "to travel light when it comes to preconception" and to enter the darkness "with [our] eyes open." Woolf's "Darkness"—or the "Inexplicable"— is a zone of ambiguity, a liminal space where ideology and consciousness can shift and expand.

Photo World interview, Beijing, China






In conjunction with the installation "Persona Case Study", Laura Albert joins Jasmin Lim for a discussion moderated by SF Camerwork curator, Chuck Mobley, at ATA on Wednesday, August 24, 2011 7pm.


Control Group is an investigation into the individual artistic process and the risks taken when directed to work outside one’s chosen medium(s). Each artist will communicate their ideas and aesthetics through unfamiliar means, allowing new variables to emerge. We intend to challenge the comfort zones artists sometimes inhabit by asking them to relinquish a degree of control over their creativity, while perhaps exercising it more completely than usual, invigorating the dialogue between artist and viewer. Control Group is an invitation to make mistakes. While this may seem counterintuitive, we see the threshold between success and failure as a space for progress.

Co-curated by Chris Fallon and Jasmin Lim

Artists: Nate Boyce / Joshua Churchill / Chris Fitzpatrick / Colter Jacobsen / Jennifer Locke/ Sean McFarland / Keegan McHargue / Emily Prince / Paul Schiek / Leslie Shows/ Margaret Tedesco / Paul Wackers / Lindsey White / David Wilson

and “The Vallejo” performance by John Chiara


Artists in “Air Waves” experiment with the mechanics of perception – showing various ways perception is shaped by context.

“I’m the antenna catching vibration / You’re the transmitter give information.” - Kraftwerk

Sept 18 - Oct 25, 2009 at Painted Bird