“Overbooked,” New Jersey, Kate Dodd

Remnants Returned to the Public in Beautified Forms: Kate Dodd's Upcycling Installation Project

Olivia Ann Carye Hallstein

Kate Dodd fights waste with ideas manifested into public installations. Whether the work is discarded paper and books transformed into interactive and dynamic biomimicking structures or additions to natural environments, it is community-oriented. Through subtle metaphor, she challenges her audience to open their perspective on both their surroundings and histories. Her work is currently exhibited at the Bay Ridge public art exhibition in Brooklyn, NYC until the 11th of July.

“Through an Ecological Lens”, Bay Ridge, 73rd Street Public Library, Brooklyn, NYC, Kate Dodd

Kate, I admire your resourcefulness. When I see the materials that you use in your work, I think of the remnants of processed natural materials that are integrated into urban landscapes (books, packaging, etc). What is it about the materials you choose and how people interact with waste materials that influence your practice most?

I have always had a tremendous fascination with materials and making. So when I see materials being disposed of without much thought, whether in the trash stream or as individual bits of litter, I see both treasure and mistreatment, and feel an immediate need to resurrect the neglected and disrespected. These resurrections stand as a metaphor for people as well, but this is much easier to do with discarded materials. I want people to see their surroundings more fully and to sensitize them to their actions and relationships with both humans and materials.

I choose to work with paper based products, as opposed to plastic. This is something I have been learning about the last few years.  As indestructible as plastic is, it is highly decay-able, which presents certain problems when using this material outdoors. Paper, on the other hand, is an instant indoor material, and infinitely flexible.

“Through an Ecological Lens,” Bay Ridge, 73rd Street Public Library, Brooklyn, NYC, Kate Dodd

Like the paper installation in Bay Ridge where you integrate the local community into your process of creative development. What has been most rewarding and challenging about working with the community your work is serving?

Diversity of interactions and reactions, getting to understand a community more intimately, breaking down my own cynicism about the possibility of people working together, have been some of the top benefits. When you work with a community, you get to be a part of it, and feeling part of a community is a joyous thing. Working with a specific landscape - in this case, a community of trees - brings similar joy on every level.

As far as challenges go, communicating with a wide array of people is complicated. It can be hard to know who to reach out to, how to motivate people to respond, and accepting interpretations of directions that are different from your own interpretations. These are the same concerns that come with many jobs.

“Through an Ecological Lens,” Bay Ridge, 73rd Street Public Library, Brooklyn, NYC, Kate Dodd

And you seem to account for ideas and perspectives through creative writing as both content and tool. What effect are you able to achieve when using text as a structural visual format?

The text I incorporate is often “factual”, content from reference materials, or former sources of “truth”. I’m interested in how much reference sources reveal about the cultural context of their time, often in striking contrast to contemporary understanding of the same issues.  We question how much we value information when the information is revealed to be biased at best.

“Before Brick City,” cut paper installation, 800’ long commercial window space, Kate Dodd

So, you use text-as-structure to serve the purpose of revealing untold stories. One way you do this through the installation in Bay Ridge is by building books for visitors to interact with. What are you mindful of when choosing what to share and how?

I often look for words or phrases that reveal contradictions or open holes between my experience and the experience being presented in the text. Because the text I incorporate is often out of order or missing words, the remaining text allows for innuendo, assumption, and hybrid concepts. The use of text also reflects themes of internal thought and experience that each individual gathers, stores, digests, transforms, and then might put back into the world as a consumer of written content. I like leaving room in the gaps for the reader to fill.  Like a mad lib in a way.

“Free Verse,”,10’ x 20’ x 20’, printed vinyl on cut polycarbonate, Redwood City Public Library Children’s Room, Kate Dodd

I used to love mad libs! It is inspiring how you are using these implied metaphors. What struck me in a description of another found-object installation (Boxes & boxes) is your description: “building with these materials adds to my understanding of evolution; many small parts that are propelled by some sort of life force to combine and grow. I think of each installation as a landscape, or an ecosystem, each material with a specific role to play.”  What role do ecological themes play in your upcycling process?

I seem to perpetually try to create the illusion of life and movement with inanimate objects.  The beauty that is basic to movement is missing in objects. Some part of me always wants to redeem these "dumb",  but innocent objects and lift them into a more beautiful and dynamic place. 

I also see the illusion of movement as an indicator of the unavoidable presence and future impact of producing so much waste.  When I can create these illusions out of disposable products, it’s an attempt to control the uncontrollable, to orchestrate or redirect the impending disaster of accumulated waste that I’m constantly aware of. 

“Flotation Device Series,” Seagull Rock, Kate Dodd

And waste is not only an urban problem! Your practice approaches this through public art installations and interventions in more rural natural environments (ex. Flotation device series, Ebb & Flow: Claim it). How does your process change when working creating “landscapes” in urban environments versus exploring the human-hand in natural environments? Does your audience approach your work differently?

Generally speaking, people are more protective and less welcoming of interventions in non-urban settings. While I'm not aware of approaching my audience differently, one of the main things that seems to impact the reception of my work is the audience’s sense of territoriality and familiarity. If the site I’m working with has less visible human interaction, aka what we think of as nature, then I may get a more visceral, and negative reaction. The other inhabitants of that space have a more fixed idea of what a disruption looks like, even though they themselves may be having greater impact on the given site than my artwork does. In some ways, city dwellers are used to having public institutions, such as libraries and parks, host a variety of interventions. And in urban settings, where there is often a tremendous amount going on,  viewers might feel more free to ignore you, or see public space as less pure than nature, so new things are absorbed more readily.

"False Spring," 10’ x 16’ x 11’, plastic bottles, plastic netting, Baird Community Center, South Orange, New Jersey, Kate Dodd

Thank you, Kate!