Public Functionary presents Smoke and Ground, a showcase exhibition curated by Adrienne Doyle of Burn Something Collective. Featuring emerging artists in our PF Studio Program, Smoke and Ground sinks itself into the landscape of memory and place through acts of recalling, reconfiguring, and re-enacting. In personal reflections, Doyle mused: “I live within an archive of memory and infrastructure; the ephemeral and the tangible. Smoke and ground. As I stroll my neighborhood, I see memories jutting out of place. The streets are crowded even when they’re empty.” Drawing from questions she has been grappling with in her own life and creative practice, Doyle poses an exhibition framework for contributing artists:
Where do our memories live in our landscape and how do they tie or sever us from place? How do they change our landscape and how does this new landscape change us?
Doyle is a zine artist, writer, and curator. Her creative practice examines place, migration, and memory through an interdisciplinary use of Audre Lorde’s concept of biomythography. In lieu of writing a traditional curatorial statement, Doyle presents this zine as meditation on the exhibition prompt.