Old Growth, 2015
Aggregate Space, Oakland, CA
Old Growth, Peterson’s first solo exhibition, was a sculptural sound installation that included a natural mixture of fabricated and organic materials built around a traditionally masculine syntax. Raised in a coastal redwood logging and fishing town, Peterson watched his male role models struggle to find direction while the way of life and livelihoods that solidified their identity crumbled around them. With this body of work, Peterson subtly invites the viewer to join him in a meditation on growth and loss, preservation and decay, traditional masculine identities and human inheritance.
Spawning ground invites the viewer into a meditative multi-sensorial experience by transporting the participants underwater to a symbolic salmon spawning bed. Sound elements are created by golf balls in jars jostled by arduino-controlled servo motors and vacuum pumps which pull suction on Ball canning jars. These sounds create a mantra that serves as a meditative sound-scape for the viewer to reflect on themes of lineage, inheritance, and life cycle.
Spawning Ground
Alter serves as both an homage to and critique of the bonding rituals, rights of passage, and masculine identities the artist experienced growing up in a small town on California’s Northern Coast. The materials highlight shared experiences of manual labor, abalone diving, drinking & hunting, and include worn out work gloves canned in whiskey as well as Peterson’s own work boots fastened on logs, which were part of a previous performance piece depicting a larger-than-life lumberjack.
Alter
Small kinetic sound pieces often serve as material studies for Peterson’s larger installations. These works act as the seeds for the rest of the body and in them the viewer finds its broader themes distilled into more bite-sized portions.
