Cooler but still well above normal this week

MPR News helps you turn down the noise and build shared understanding. Turn up your support for this public resource and keep trusted journalism accessible to all. 

Turn Up Your Support

The College of St. Benedict and St. John's University in Collegeville present 

.  Ebben (a Minnesota native who now lives in New York) creates fragmented visual narratives that offer various paths for the viewer to explore, whether it's through video, prints, or sculpture. Ebben says he's attempting to put the audience in his own footsteps and then have them make parallels to their own lives.

"Trails and Parallels" brings together a series of works that span six years, constructed  through whatever means possible to convey a particular ideas. The most ethereal of those works might be the blue and white cyanotypes.

In the 15-minute video "Brooklyn Bridge" a simple walk becomes an almost Herculean task. The subject of the video is wearing shoes that are affixed to large buckets, forcing him to take arduous steps as he traverses the bridge. Ebben says he imagines the "bucket walker" to be not unlike the Greek character Sisyphus who is eternally pushing a  boulder uphill. The bucket walker makes his way south through Queens and Brooklyn until he reaches the Brooklyn Bridge to begin his walk again, forever creating this pattern.

Ebben says his performance and video work tend to put the performer in a compromised situation.  Performers in his videos are often times asked to complete a task that was awkward and imposed.  Ebben says while the performers may feel uncomfortable in the situation, they often make some personal discoveries in the process.

Often times Ebben's imagery involves binding his feet or his hands. Other pieces in the exhibition include a woven tapestry, a ladder made from canes and a series of guache paintings. The exhibition runs May 27 - July 22 in the Alice R. Rogers and Target Galleries on the College of St. Benedict and St. John's University campus.

Arts and Culture

State of the Arts Blog

Marianne Combs

Author

Dean Ebben explores the nature of our personal journeys with pretty much anything he can get his hands on.

Similar journeys, on different paths

Go Deeper.

Like this?

News you can use in your inbox