Installation history:

NSCAD University: Port Campus
Dec 2019

Anna Leonowens (NSCAD Student Art Awards exhibition)
Dec 15, 2020 – Jan 14, 2021

Vascular System, 2019
NSCAD Port Campus

7ft x 3ft x 3ft (main body) tubing extends beyond the body to incorporate with the architecture of the space.
Steel, plastic, oil, barrel pump

This massive, hand pumped industrial heart was first installed on the ground floor of the NSCAD Port Campus in Halifax, NS. It functions conceptually as the vascular system of the space it occupies.

Participation and input in our environments is integral to creating spaces that we all want to be in, to work in, and to make, share and experience art in. Spaces are only truly activated when those who inhabit them, meaningfully engage with them.

The work both anchors and connects the environment it is constructed in as one organism. The structures we inhabit are bodies that hold space. What we do in these spaces, how we act and interact within them, effects how the space functions as a whole. I believe that if we want our spaces to be more inspiring, we need to make that happen. I think we can alter the feel of a space by being active within it.

The need for the work to be activated by the viewer is important, as well as the fact that if it is then left untouched it will slowly return to a static state. When the pump is activated, red oil moves through the system of veins. After someone walks away, the oil will keep flowing slowly for a time, and eventually it will come to a rest, until the next viewer reactivates it. 

The idea for this work came from an intense feeling of personal momentum combined with the desire to see the NSCAD studios really activated. It’s a plea, perhaps, or a reminder, to the other students and to myself: To use this time/space we have, and to use it well, to experiment, to get excited and creative, to push boundaries (mainly our own) and when it comes down to it: To make art.

Essentially it is as much a personal reflection, as it is a call to action.