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IB Making Art

This piece is titled Shape Shifter and was created by Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla in 2013. It is a very large piece made up of sandpaper blocks that were used on different construction sites. The blocks were used by different workers at different times but none of them are labelled or identified as to where they came from.

This piece is from an exhibit meant to draw attention to what is missing or what is often overlooked. Each of the sandpaper blocks has its own story about where it was used and who used it, but that information is not given with the exhibit. The viewer is left to imagine the lives of the workers who used the sandpaper and the different sites and buildings that it may have helped create. The actual piece is very eclectic. It is put together without a pattern and this gives it a very eye-catching quality. Sandpaper had a rough texture and this can be seen while looking at the piece and gives it a 3-D quality.

This work of art is trying to make a statement about the working class and how they are often overlooked by the rest of society. The workers put their lives into creating the foundations of great cities but who they are as people and how they contributed is often overlooked. The piece couldn't have come together without all of the pieces of sandpaper, the same way a job site needs all of the workers to run smoothly. None of the pieces of sandpaper look the same and that reflects how each of the lives of the workers are different as well. This work may also imply that everything has a deeper meaning than what it seems like just on the surface. The sandpaper makes a pretty pattern, but is still sending a message beneath that