Ariana Jacob’s “As you make your bed, so must you lie in it?” at the Portland Building Installation Space

PORTLAND, ORE – Beginning October 21st in the lobby of the Portland Building artist Ariana Jacob will present a new participatory installation to instigate conversations about what it means to be part of the United States. By presenting the U.S. Constitution as the bed we made for ourselves as a country, the artist will invite people to consider what lying on that foundation means in both poetic and practical terms—for themselves as individuals, and for the collective entity that is our country. Jacob will keep regular hours, inviting people to join her in bed to talk casually about who they are in relation to America’s foundational document and the realities and dreams those words evoke. As the installation progresses, the text of the Constitution will be collaboratively commented upon and edited on the walls of the exhibition through discussions between the artist and participants. Jacob, a veteran of conversation-based art, welcomes people to join her in contemplating American identity, addressing this document that legally and symbolically binds us together as a people.

“Our Constitution was created by individuals out of their ideals for how to best organize people to live together in a society, but it was created in a time that was very different than our present. This project explores both the possibility of renewing and making responsive this foundational document and the experience of having to live with it no matter what, whether we consciously consider it or not.”

Participate in the Installation: Meet the artist on-site Mondays from 11:30am-2:30pm, Thursdays from 2-5pm, or by appointment (contact publicwondering@gmail.com).   

About the Artist: After working as an assistant for noted artist and innovator Mierle Laderman Ukeles in New York, Portland artist Ariana Jacob received her MFA in Social Practice Art from Portland State University in 2010. She has exhibited and completed a number of projects on both coasts including her recently completed residencies for Artspace in New Haven, CT and Intersections/BCCTV here in Portland. She is a Regional Arts & Culture Council Project Grant recipient and has been both a planning committee member and panelist for the Open Engagement Conference at PSU.

Viewing Hours & Location:  The Portland Building is located at 1120 SW 5th Avenue in downtown Portland and is open 8 am to 5 pm, Monday – Friday.  For more information on the Portland Building Installation Space series, including images, proposals and statements for all the installations since 1994, go to www.racc.org/installationspace.