Sandcastles 2015

Editor: Joshua Flint's "Sandcastles," painted in 2015 with oil and acrylic on canvas, presents this unusual juxtaposition of children playing with a city skyline like it's their own personal sandbox. It feels both playful and a little… ominous? How do you interpret this work, especially concerning its materiality? Curator: This piece pulls at the threads connecting production, consumption, and imagination. Flint uses the tactile nature of oil and acrylic to create this illusion. Note the heavy impasto simulating wet sand morphing into sharp, vertical towers. Consider how the children are positioned – manipulating this urban landscape, blurring the lines between play and the literal construction of our built environment. Do you think this reflects the labor inherent in urban development? Editor: Definitely. Their play is active construction, not just idle fun. So, are you suggesting that Flint uses these familiar painting materials to comment on the very real material construction of cities, and maybe even who has the power to shape them? Curator: Precisely. The children’s dominance speaks to the power dynamics involved in shaping urban landscapes. They treat these skyscrapers like pliable clay, but whose hands *really* mold our cities? Think about the raw materials, the exploited labor, and the colossal consumption driving constant construction. Flint hints at this complex web. Editor: I never thought about sandcastles being analogous to the labor and resources behind actual cityscapes. It makes me wonder what other familiar materials are masking larger economic processes. Thanks for broadening my view! Curator: Absolutely! It’s through questioning the very makeup of our visual world that we can unearth these deeper material realities.