This weekend I visited the final week of Grand Rapids, Michigan's ArtPrize event. ArtPrize is the world's largest art competition so there was far too much for me to see in two days! However I did my best--despite chilly temperature and off-and-on rain.

There was a ton of pieces I loved--like the winning artwork, "Elephants"


But there is one in particular that really caught my attention...



Collective Cover, by Ann Morton from Phoenix, Arizona, began in January 2009 and was completed this year. The project's story states:

Living by sheer circumstance through events large and small, over time we envelope ourselves with the shroud of our cultural influences. Each of us carries with us the story, experience and history of all of those from whom we've been born--families, communities, and societies, The Members in this Collective, just as in each of us, have embedded within them a unique set of circumstances, both known and unknown.

The artist and her colleagues collected nearly 300 objects that had been randomly discarded and found along roadways and in other odd places. The objects were numbered and archived. Once fully processed, the objects were shrouded in a white linen and labeled with a unique QR code.


The unique aspect of this collection is that the artist gives you a behind the scenes look what inspired her--the history of the object in question. If you would like to know more about the object rather than its linen covering, you can use your smart phone to scan the QR codes connected to each item. By scanning the code you can learn about the objects constructed history.

The Collective Cover gives what was once a lifeless and discarded item a future by "connecting it with the timelessness of cyberspace and relative reality."





I'm no art buff but I thought this was really well thought out and executed.  What I found most interesting was the way it intertwined art, the traditional museum experience and technology in a meaningful way.

In a sea of "traditional art" this definitely stood out to me. I'm sorry I don't have anything deep to say about this but like I said, I'm no art buff... but I sure did like scanning all the items at ArtPrize and having a little giggle with my roommate over what was in some of the packages and how they were originally found.

Stay tuned for another ArtPrize-theme post, possibly!