ROUND 21 | cullective
By Ariel Wood
4/13/2024 – 7/7/2024
Round 21: cullective, by Texas based artist Ariel Wood exposes a selective gathering. The installation invokes a possible system of water collection, yet elements are either still needed or slowly being taken away. There’s a suggestion of past or future use, yet current stasis. The form of a water tower is built with steel beams woven together with blue twine. Ceramic thrown and altered pipes and vessels are held in alignment via welded steel structures bolted to concrete pavers. Each element holds the potential for collection and conveyance, yet falls short of this linear progression. The structure of the cage itself, appearing to be parked permanently—its days of fluid mobility have come to a close—is wrapped in a burlap scrim disrupted by varying sizes of cut circular vents or viewing portals. Partially protected from both sight and the elements. Round 21: cullective utilizes the relationships inherent to the exploded-view diagram—a lack of delineated function and an emphasis on labor—to call attention to access, control, and connection or a lack thereof.
Ariel Wood is a sculpture artist interested in the way plumbing and drainage can elicit notions of interconnectedness, liminality, and queerness. Their investigation of access and control through the practice of sculpture and lens of water materializes the interplay of agency and relationality. Wood picks and parses out those aspects of the larger system that appear strange, silly, or sentimental.