Weatherscapes is an artwork series exploring the relationship of the weather and the landscape as it relates to human scale. Weather—fog, lightning, rain, ice, clouds—inhabits the otherwise vast abstract space between the body and the distant horizon. Weatherscapes capture a more compact environment, one that the body can engage with physically, creating a continuous and intimate ensemble between the body, the weather and the landscape.
Rebeca Méndez was commissioned by the Los Angeles County Arts Commission to create an art installation for the Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk warehouse in Santa Fe Springs, Los Angeles County, CA. Reviewed by The Los Angeles Times
At Any Given Moment, Grass is one of a series of video and sound art installations. In an attempt to explore the nature of perception and media representation, this work focuses on the phenomenological approach of ‘stepping out’ in order to ‘see ourselves seeing.’ The repetitive rhythm, tight crop and large-scale image of the barley grass emphasize its particular organizational logic in time and space.
At Any Given Moment, Fall, is an art installation consisting of lava rocks, sound, and a video projection of a waterfall. In an attempt to explore the nature of perception and media representation, this work focuses on the phenomenological approach of ‘stepping out’ in order to ‘see ourselves seeing.’ The repetitive rhythm, tight crop and large-scale image of the waterfall emphasize its particular organizational logic in time and space.
Rebeca is working on a new photographic series called Altiplano documenting landscapes in the Altiplano in Chile, 5000 meters above sea level.
Here Over There is a photographic series that began on the island of Chiloe, Chile, on December 23, 2002 and continues to this date. I photograph the beds I sleep on during my travels with consistent parameters—the image is taken as soon as I awake, on the first morning of my stay, with the available light, with a hand held camera, and from the same point of view. The idea of my hotel beds came from the thought that I might never sleep in this bed again, and most likely I will never even remember this intimate moment of full surrendering.
This project was created in response to the invasion of Iraq. 06.06.06: PETROLEUM: Nymex Crude Future ($71.65/bbl); Reported Killed by the Military Intervention in Iraq: 42,646 Civilians and 2,476 US Military. Missing or Captured: 17,869. Wounded in Action: 17,869. Journalists Killed: 97.
Rebeca Méndez: About To Happen. 10.07.06 – 12.07.06. AndLab / Art / Los Angeles. Curator: Sunook Park. Méndez’s latest photographic work About to Happen consists of isolated single still frames of her 16mm film shoot throughout Iceland. In Dettifoss 001, Méndez captures an instant of Europe’s largest waterfall—500 cubic metres per second, and in Brekka 001, a moment of giant rye grass being forcefully blown by the wind.
‘Méndez, in her Homeland series, explores a sense of ambivalence—while her panoramic images allude to the sublime in nature, they simultaneously reveal their synthetic process of construction. Incorporated in each landscape is a short line of text capturing a sensation, memory, or experience triggered by the landscape, including references to sustenance—for example, the words ‘till the last tree’ over an image of cows grazing.
Homeland # 2, (Series), 2006: Homeland, Peace White; Homeland, Low Green; Homeland, Guarded Blue; Homeland, Elevated Yellow; Homeland, High Orange; Homeland, Severe Red. Materials: Lightjet print, plexiglass, anodized aluminum. 40×15 x 15 inches each. Exhibited at Second Natures, 10.12 – 11.18.2006 at Eli and Edyth Broad Art Center, Los Angeles and at HAAZ Gallery in Istanbul, 11.2006.
Rebeca Méndez joined Morphosis Architects as Design | Media Arts consultant for the Lincoln Center Harmony Atrium in New York City. Méndez developed a master plan for the development, and created a series of concepts for media art installations. Although we were one of the two finalists for the project, the job was awarded to architects Billie Tsien and Tod Williams. The following text, written by Anne Marie Burke or Morphosis, is an excerpt from our presentation to the Harmony Atrium board.
Thom Mayne and his firm Morphosis designed a 353,000 sq. ft. student recreation center on the campus at the University of Cincinnati, which opened on May, 2006. Rebeca Méndez was commissioned to create six murals measuring 9 by 20 feet each to be suspended from the ceiling at the convenience store of the Rec Center…
Thom Mayne and his firm Morphosis designed a 353,000 sq. ft. student recreation center on the campus at the University of Cincinnati, which opened on May, 2006. Rebeca Méndez was commissioned to create a public art installation on four cone-like structures, two of them reaching over 50 feet high and piercing through the roof….
Visual identity design and mural and video installations for the Tsunami Asian Grill Restaurant in the Venetian Casino in Las Vegas
This is a love letter sent to Adam seven years ago when he was living in Amsterdam and I in California. We communicated via email, yet the disembodied language of e-mail and a double distance, not only physically but most importantly a distance in time, woke a desperate and silent attempt of making the writing machine into a sensual machine…
