Philagrafika presents Megawords
Powel House Museum
Philadelphia, PA
September 5-12, 2006
Curated by Robert Wuilfe, Presented by Philagrafika
Exhibition text by Robert Wuilfe
Think about the idea of a historic house museum of the scale and grandeur of the Powel House for a moment. Look around at the painstakingly restored woodwork, the Chippendale furniture, the grand mahogany staircase and the ballroom. They do a great job of letting you know what life was like in 18th century urban America, right? Perhaps they do not. Walking around the house, you will see no sign of the servants (and perhaps slaves) who scrubbed the pine floors with lye and hot sand. You won’t experience the smells of the pre-sewer, pre-industrial age city coming in through the windows. You will see the trappings of immense wealth and privilege, but little that has any relationship to the life of the average city-dweller of either the 18th or 21st centuries.
Dan Murphy and Tony Smyrski, through their ongoing Megawords project, are very committed to documenting and disseminating images of urban life—in a way that captures much of what a traditional house museum misses. Megawords is about people surviving and living in cities and countries all over the world. Till this exhibition, the primary medium of their exploration has been the freely-distributed print publication Megawords.
Through this magazine, Murphy and Smyrski have shown how artwork that pushes the boundaries of the printed image can transform our understanding of art and the way we see the world. The idealism behind this project hearkens back to the 18th century tradition of populist publications such as Thomas Paine’s Common Sense, which was printed just down the street from the building you’re standing in.
Megawords magazine is a "free" magazine in the broadest sense of the word. Free of advertising for starters, but also free of any editorial format, legal owner or commercial purpose. What's left is a file of images, stories, people and other documentary findings. Murphy and Smyrski accept that this material is powerful enough to speak for itself, which is why they present it with as little editorial framing as possible. We have enough in common that the evidence of our daily lives requires no outside narration or explanation to begin making sense.
For their installation here at Powel House, Murphy and Smyrski have transformed the customary 18th reconstruction you would normally encounter. By taking their print- and photo-based artistic practice into an immersive environment that includes video projection, sound and sculptural elements, they ask you to look with new vision. They ask you to look at images of this modern world, and perhaps connect them to your own lives and the notions of “history” you brought with you when you walked through the door. What do the images and environments you will encounter throughout the museum mean? That is up to you.
Read the ArtForum review of the project here.
Read the Philadelphia Weekly article here (PDF).
Click on images below to advance slideshow.
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