Stack Series 2008

Curator: Kate Carr’s *Stack Series*, dating from 2008, presents us with an intriguing object of layered surfaces and textures. Editor: Oh, it gives me this strange sense of calm. Like looking at sedimentary rock, all these layers slowly built up. And I want to run my fingers across it! Curator: The work can be situated within discourses of serial art and assemblage. Consider the interplay of line, form, and materiality: these stacks become visual systems of horizontal registers. The composition is relentlessly linear, yet there are subtle tonal shifts and chromatic variations between the individual layers that articulate its construction. Editor: You know, it also makes me think of those architectural models, all clean lines and minimalist forms. Except this feels less... precise. More about the texture and rhythm of the materials themselves. What exactly are they made of? Curator: It is a mixed media artwork with diverse found material. Carr repurposes materials into a formal study. Editor: Which adds a kind of found poetry element to the mix. Each layer with its unique color feels like a little visual haiku. They repeat yet vary and form these new wholes in a very serial progression of art, as you say. So, while incredibly restrained, it offers all these little jolts of surprise. I would feel grounded around that work in a busy city! Curator: Indeed, and through its engagement with the readymade, *Stack Series* also references modernist movements and, through its commitment to line and surface, aligns itself with formal abstraction. The non-objective composition focuses on form over representational meaning. Editor: It's true; its reduction really allows one to look very closely at these micro-details! To contemplate serial production itself, but without sacrificing these material realities that whisper histories! Well, Kate Carr gave me a stack to think about! Curator: A fascinating piece to unravel visually, and experientially indeed.