The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber (2005)
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber (2005) was created for Kirsten Lavers' Taxi Gallery, literally a retired London cab moored on the front-lawn of a Cambridge council estate. The work, made in collaboration withJudd Morrissey creates haunting visual/textual memorials to disappearing working class iconographies, particularly those that place the masculine figure in relation to domestic and vehicular space.
From the living room windowsill of 38 Stanesfield Road, carefully constructed acts (both written and performed) of labour and mourning are projected each evening onto the side windows of the taxi cab. A silent figure builds, with model farmhouse, tools, tractors, lorries, and die-cut men, a series of near-still portraits that are interrupted by the attempts of a software program to represent task-based labor through graphical and textual routines. The scenes give homage to the passing of a day that is haunted by the absence of men who, through death or infirmity, have left their labours behind - whose vehicles will not run anymore because the worker has stopped working.
The nighttime state of the piece (digital projection) was built as an instrument for live performance and recorded sessions were sent overseas for the taxi at intervals throughout the exhibition period. The daylight state reveals a further narrative fabric upon the windows of the taxi made up of images and texts partly drawn from journal entries made by Thomas J. Morissey Sr., a World War II veteran, who died in 2004.
The closing event, which took place in the scout hut behind the house, featured a live performance by Judd Morrissey and Mark Jeffery as well as additional performances from Kirsten Lavers, cris cheek, and John Cayley.
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Photograph by Kirsten Lavers
Taxigallery, Cambridge
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Photograph by Kirsten Lavers
Taxigallery, Cambridge
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Photograph by Kirsten Lavers
Taxigallery, Cambridge
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Photograph by Kirsten Lavers
Taxigallery, Cambridge
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Photograph by Kirsten Lavers
Taxigallery, Cambridge
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Photograph by Kirsten Lavers
Taxigallery, Cambridge
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Photograph by Kirsten Lavers
Taxigallery, Cambridge
The Mooring of Richard AnyNumber Research Document
Camera: Mark Jeffery
© Mark Jeffery 1994 - 2011