CONRAD BAKKER

UNTITLED PROJECT: MOUNTAIN/ROCK SHOP, Oil paint on carved wood,...

Tue, 10 Sep 2019 17:19:08 -0400

UNTITLED PROJECT: MOUNTAIN/ROCK SHOP, Oil paint on carved wood, 2019 >> Untitled Project: Mountain/Rock Shop is an investigation of a particular place through objects and images — in particular, hand-carved and painted rocks based on real rocks collected in and around the Wood River Valley during the last two weeks of May 2019, and small landscape paintings of mountains based on specific real estate photographs of land for sale in the same geography. All of these things have been constructed as contemplative devices—specific things that are slowly seen and/or held in order to help one connect to a knowledge of another thing. All of these things have also been intentionally produced and positioned as curious commodities or strange souvenirs of a specific place.

What does it mean to interpret a place or value a landscape as a commodity? Unfortunately, over the past two centuries this particular Idahoan landscape has been repeatedly objectified, its value reduced to pelts, minerals, and mountain views––its capacity has become complicated. In the end, these hand-made sculptures of local rocks and intimate paintings of real estate mountains aspire to be oblique, desirable products that move awkwardly from inception to production to transaction to display—at once imitating the commodification of place but also providing a momentary pause for considering our location in a landscape that is always changing.

Untitled Project: Mountain/Rock Shop is part of the exhibition “Marketplaces: From Open Air to Online” curated by Courtney Gilbert at the Sun Valley Center for the Arts in Ketchum, Idaho and is on view from August 30 to November 8, 2019. All the carved/painted rocks are for sale, either ON-SITE for $125.00 or ONLINE at a price based on your distance, in walking hours, to Sun Valley, Idaho.

>> LINK TO PROJECT WEBSITE <<

UNTITLED PROJECT: MOUNTAIN/ROCK SHOP [LAND] >> Oil paint...

Tue, 10 Sep 2019 17:15:08 -0400

UNTITLED PROJECT: MOUNTAIN/ROCK SHOP [LAND] >> Oil paint on wood panel, 165 x 215mm, 2019 >> Untitled Project: Mountain/Rock Shop [Land] involves a series of paintings based on images taken from Sun Valley, Idaho Realtor websites, specifically featuring land for sale.

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu / In Search of...

Sun, 03 Feb 2019 19:15:00 -0500

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu / In Search of Lost Time [Memes], Oil paint on carved wood, 2018 >> Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu / In Search of Lost Time [Memes] is part of an ongoing reflection on Marcel Proust’s multi-volume novel as a collection of material objects and phenomenological things that foreground the physicality of reading and the materiality of memory through technological screens and Proustian memes.

w/ Galerie Analix Forever @ Galeristes, Paris November 29- December 2, 2018

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu [Édition...

Wed, 09 Jan 2019 14:21:55 -0500

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu [Édition Originale], Oil paint on carved wood, Edition of 10 >> Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu [Édition Originale] is a carved and painted sculpture of the original edition of Marcel Proust’s epic novel: In Search of Lost Time. As this sculpture is part of an edition of 10, each edition will be constructed to order and the price of each consecutive edition will increase by 1000 Euros, which means that by the tenth edition the price of the sculpture and the real original édition will be within range of each other.

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu / In Search of...

Wed, 09 Jan 2019 14:11:59 -0500

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu / In Search of Lost Time [Twitter /Marginalia], Oil paint on wood panel, dimensions variable, 2018 >> Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu / In Search of Lost Time [Twitter /Marginalia] is part of an ongoing reflection on Marcel Proust’s multi-volume novel as a collection of material objects and phenomenological things that foreground the physicality of reading and the materiality of memory through technological screens and Proustian memes. This series of paintings in particular is based on twitter images shared by readers of In Search of Lost Time that offer both a verification of reading and individuation through analog and digital marginalia.

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu [Vintage...

Tue, 08 Jan 2019 14:11:59 -0500

Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu [Vintage Proust], Oil paint on carved wood, 1:1 scale, 2018 >> Untitled Project: À la Recherche du Temps Perdu [Vintage Proust] is a carved and painted set of recent paperbacks of Marcel Proust’s epic novel: In Search of Lost Time published by Vintage Books.

UNTITLED PROJECT: Still Life/ Style Leaf [UW Parkside], Oil...

Thu, 08 Nov 2018 10:24:56 -0500

UNTITLED PROJECT: Still Life/ Style Leaf [UW Parkside], Oil paint on carved wood, 2018 >> An updated reflection on things and their representations through a series of repetitions sited in two facing display cabinets in the entrance of the University of Wisconsin Parkside gallery. The title of this project is borrowed from Georges Perec’s brief essay Still Life /Style Leaf in which he describes the everyday objects on his writing desk and then repeats the task, literally describing his description and letting the differences separate the two events.

UNTITLED PROJECT: ROBERT SMITHSON LIBRARY & BOOK CLUB, Oil...

Fri, 01 Sep 2017 13:25:43 -0400

UNTITLED PROJECT: ROBERT SMITHSON LIBRARY & BOOK CLUB, Oil paint on carved wood, 2014 — 2018

>> Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club consists of carved
and painted book/sculptures based on the titles from the personal library of conceptual artist and land art pioneer Robert Smithson. Smithson’s personal library is notable in that his titles reveal a wide range of subjects, providing a unique window into his research and practice—and also functioning like a time capsule featuring the culture and ideas of his time. Soon after Robert Smithson’s untimely death in 1973, all of his books were catalogued, boxed, and placed into the Archives of American Art, where they currently reside.

Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club exists in two forms: first as a comprehensive installation, a carved and painted sculptural rendering of every single title/edition from Robert Smithson’s library. And second, as a Book Club membership program that functions like a distributed archive—with participants from all over the world who purchase the second (and final) iteration of a carved and painted book sculpture from the available titles. In many ways, this part of the project operates like one of Smithson’s non-sites, slowly marking the time, distance and trajectories between books, ideas, persons, and spaces.

If you would like to become a member of the Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club, please use the project website to find the book/title you want and to make sure it is still available. Then reserve that book using the printable order form or the secure online reservation form or email your reservation information directly to conradbakker@untitledprojects.com.

Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library and Book Club has been exhibited in growing stages of completion, first at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts, The Wright Museum at Beloit College, and The Cress Gallery at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. If you or your institution would like to host the Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library and Book Club comprehensive installation, booking is already underway for Fall 2018 and Spring and Fall 2019. For additional information, please contact: conradbakker@untitledprojects.com

UNTITLED PROJECT: ROBERT SMITHSON LIBRARY & BOOK CLUB +...

Thu, 16 Feb 2017 00:18:14 -0500

UNTITLED PROJECT: ROBERT SMITHSON LIBRARY & BOOK CLUB + UNTITLED PROJECT: THE CRYSTAL LAND @ The Cress Gallery, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga.

>> This exhibition featured two ongoing bodies of work, Untitled Project: Robert Smithson Library & Book Club and Untitled Project: The Crystal Land—both based on the personal library and geological interests of the late, conceptual artist and land art pioneer, Robert Smithson. 

UNTITLED PROJECT: ROBERT SMITHSON LIBRARY & BOOK CLUB
UNTITLED PROJECT: THE CRYSTAL LAND

UNTITLED PROJECT: ANY THING YOU WANT, oil on carved wood,...

Tue, 07 Feb 2017 10:22:29 -0500

UNTITLED PROJECT: ANY THING YOU WANT, oil on carved wood, variable, 2014+ >> The world is filled with things. Things that are made, things that are bought and sold, things that are collected and displayed, things that are hidden or lost, things that will all eventually disappear. These things reveal themselves to us through their uses and their physical matter, but also through their absences. Consider that pocketknife lost while camping, that coveted designer handbag that was never purchased, that classic rock album thrown away by a careless parent, or that dog-eared copy of Walden that was lent to a friend who has yet to give it back. These missing things create a provocative negative space in our daily lives, a demanding absence, a longing.

Untitled Project: ANY THING YOU WANT is designed to help fill your empty space of longing with a real, hand-carved and painted sculpture, a tangible simulation of that specific thing you want. This simulated thing will stand in for and point to the very thing you want even as it foregrounds the absence of the real thing. This project is positioned somewhere between a custom carved/painted sculpture-to-order service and a surrogate replacement agency for lost or missing things. In every way, Untitled Project: ANY THING YOU WANT provides us with an extended opportunity to think about things.

UNTITLED PROJECT: ANY THING YOU WANT / website
Untitled Project: Any Thing You Want / ARCHIVE

Untitled Project: Suggestion Box, Oil paint on carved wood,...

Wed, 16 Nov 2016 10:51:34 -0500

Untitled Project: Suggestion Box, Oil paint on carved wood, installed in office of the School of Art + Design at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, 2016 >> a carved/painted locked box soliciting suggestions, indicating anonymity, implying institutional reception of recommended improvements or needed change. While this suggestion box sculpture is functional in that it can receive actual suggestions, it is an inherently closed system, anything that enters the box stays in the box as part of its content(s).

Untitled Project: Still Life /Style Leaf, Oil paint on carved...

Tue, 08 Nov 2016 14:49:55 -0500

Untitled Project: Still Life /Style Leaf, Oil paint on carved wood, 2016 >>
An abridged version of Untitled Project: Still Life / Style Leaf, positioned on opposite sides of the same gallery wall. This project was constructed for the faculty exhibition at the Krannert Art Museum in the School of Art and Design at the University of Illinois.

UNTITLED PROJECT: STILL LIFE / STYLE LEAF, oil on carved wood,...

Tue, 08 Nov 2016 14:49:55 -0500

UNTITLED PROJECT: STILL LIFE / STYLE LEAF, oil on carved wood, installed, 2016 >> a reflection on things and their representations using the strategy of a still life to arrange a series of repetitions. The title of this project is borrowed from Georges Perec’s brief essay Still Life /Style Leaf in which he describes the everyday objects on his writing desk and then repeats the task, literally describing his description and letting the differences separate the two events. In a similar way, Untitled Project: Still Life /Style Leaf uses repetition and representation to connect and complicate the things themselves through their forms, their uses, and their arrangements.

Untitled Project: Still Life / Style Leaf
Devening Projects + Editions

UNTITLED PROJECT: CRAIGSLIST [TVs], oil on wood panel,...

Mon, 31 Oct 2016 18:17:04 -0400

UNTITLED PROJECT: CRAIGSLIST [TVs], oil on wood panel, dimensions variable, 2017 >> a series of paintings of television screens based on images of craigslist classified ads for televisions. These paintings are priced, titled, and sized using information from the original classified, their reflective surfaces revealing an enigmatic portrait of anonymous craigslist sellers in their domestic spaces, taking a picture of their television.

Untitled Project: Craigslist [TVs] [Free tv / still works, just heavy]
Oil paint on Wood Panel. 15 x 20 x 2 inches, 2017

Untitled Project: Craigslist [TVs] [60 inch LG TV - $400]
Oil paint on Wood Panel, 31 x 50 x 2 inches, 2017

Untitled Project: Craigslist [TVs][Mitsubishi TV, good working condition]
Oil paint on wood Panel, 22 x 29 x 2 inches, 2017

UNTITLED PROJECT: CABIN [ WALDEN / ANGLET ], Oil and enamel...

Sun, 09 Oct 2016 10:42:55 -0400

UNTITLED PROJECT: CABIN [ WALDEN / ANGLET ], Oil and enamel paint on wood construction, 2016 >> a carved and painted replica of Henry David Thoreau’s cabin at Walden Pond near Concord, Massachusetts. This cabin-as-object is intended to function as a sincere/unsatisfactory object providing a critical commentary on the theatre of nature and the commodification of self-reliance––all of which is useful for considering one’s place in the natural world. This project was sited specifically on the shore of Lac Nord of Izadia Ecological Park in Anglet, France for La Littorale #6, Biennale Internationale D’Art Contemporain Anglet-Côte Basque curated by Paul Ardenne.

Untitled Project: Gold/eBAY [Australia], oil on wood panel,...

Mon, 04 Apr 2016 10:21:03 -0400

Untitled Project: Gold/eBAY [Australia], oil on wood panel, 2016 >> a series of paintings based on online auction images of gold nuggets in/from Australia. These particular paintings feature the images where the seller placed the gold material next to an Australian coin to provide an understanding of physical scale. These paintings are also titled and priced according to their originating auction, providing a commentary on shifting economic trends as well as the strange relationship between money and material.

Creative Accounting - curated by Holly Williams

UNTITLED PROJECT: FREE BEER!, Oil on carved wood, 2015...

Mon, 18 Jan 2016 11:00:23 -0500

UNTITLED PROJECT: FREE BEER!, Oil on carved wood, 2015 >> an homage to both Tom Marioni’s mantra: the act of drinking beer with friends is the highest form of art, and to the historic beer that made Milwaukee famous when Mr. Schlitz sent boatloads of free product to the thirsty victims of the great Chicago fire.

Untitled Project: Things [Georges Perec / Les choses], Oil on...

Mon, 18 Jan 2016 10:59:50 -0500

Untitled Project: Things [Georges Perec / Les choses], Oil on wood panel, 2015 >> a series of oil paintings based on online auction images of french copies of Georges Perec’s famous book Les choses. This project examines the shifting relationship between authors and readers, buyers and sellers, images and objects, and books and commodities.

This project was exhibited in the Biennale d'art Contemporain Hybride 2015 in Douai, France and at the 2017 Young Art International Art Fair, Paris, France.

UNTITLED PROJECT: THE CRYSTAL LAND, 2015 >> is an...

Wed, 25 Mar 2015 16:06:37 -0400

UNTITLED PROJECT: THE CRYSTAL LAND, 2015 >> is an installation of sculpture and paintings, loosely influenced by the famous Robert Smithson essay of the same title. The object/paintings of minerals are based on online auction images featuring portraits of rocks in the hands of their owners. These highly constructed pictures of mineral commodities evoke subjects of amateur rock collecting, industrial mining, internet economies, hand labor, and material properties.

> Untitled Project: The Crystal Land (official website)

UNTITLED PROJECT: EBAY [DING], oil paint on wood panel, 2015...

Sun, 01 Feb 2015 11:03:58 -0500

UNTITLED PROJECT: EBAY [DING], oil paint on wood panel, 2015 >> a growing series of paintings based upon ebay auction images of mid-century modern furniture—reducing the auction identification to the one image that reveals the flaw, ding, scratch, etc. Each painting was titled according to the original and priced according to the final sales value. This series of paintings was including in the traveling exhibition: METAMODERN curated by Judith Hoos Fox and Ginger Duggan.