Chris Larson

Chris Larson’s artwork can take many forms—drawing, performance, sculpture, video—depending on the concept he seeks to convey. Sometimes, as in his video Heavy Rotation, Larson deploys all of these media to dramatic effect. The video begins with an overhead shot of the artist using a rudimentary compass to draw a circle. Suddenly, the bottom literally falls out of the drawing, revealing a previously-concealed room underneath, into which the artist descends and begins the process again.
 
The entire architectural structure then rotates on end with the artist beginning anew in each successive room. Confounding our assumptions about real and imagined space, the video presents the artistic gesture as both heroic and futile: once you finally reach the other side of the drawing, you’re immediately met with a new space of challenge and discovery. No matter the medium, Larson’s work builds on a historical tradition of interrogating the very method of making art, referencing Surrealist automatic drawing, midcentury gestural painting, and the analytic inquiry of conceptual artists.