Patrick Jacob’s Fantastical World of Nocturnes
Patrick Jacobs’ work borders on the edge of fantasy and reality. Crafting dioramas that are
rendered from a fixed point of view is his more recognizable medium, you would never know that
his primary interest lies in lens-based media. The exhibition Nocturnes at the KCAI Crossroads
Gallery: Center for Contemporary Practice greets you with a monolith of sorts: an unusual looking
structure in which you enter an orifice feeds into the main space of the gallery. As you move
through the space, you are guided into the side gallery using the predetermined exit point where
viewers come into contact with Jacobs’ bronze-casted mud sculptures and 2D work. Feeling like a
booger that’s been blown out into a kleenex, the space funneled me into the side gallery that
contained mud sculptures casted in bronze and flat works from Jacobs. Radically different from his
detailed installation, the sculptures resembled phallic shapes which are then reiterated on a
smaller scale within the tableaus. The flat work on the walls was rendered in a primal manner,
focusing on shape and form within their compositions and complimented the organic nature of the
sculptures.
Installation view from Patrick Jacobs’ Nocturnes. Photo courtesy of the artist
The wood that the structure was made out of was unfinished and organic, mimicking the raw
nature of his mud sculptures. The structure felt intentionally temporary, like viewers were
supposed to only be able to experience this for a specific increment of time. When I first entered
the constructed room, the painted grey walls induced a feeling of claustrophobia that made me
feel as though I was in a cave. This feeling was propelled by the dimmed overhead lighting,
drawing my attention to the different sized illuminated circles that were spaced out in a vertical
line moving across each wall. Possessing qualities similar to those of a skylight, the circles pulled
me into the compositions that were found inside.
Photo from inside the structure. Courtesy of the artist.
I felt like a voyeur witnessing a private moment that was never meant to be seen. After a while of
peering into each hole and walking around the space, I started to feel uneasy and disassociated
from the gallery space itself, eventually believing that we had actually been transported to a
fictional world. The space felt void of purpose, and didn’t contain anything other than the viewing
apparatuses that had been crafted to peer into the dioramas. The different sizes of circles were
reminiscent of gloryholes and made it feel as though I was placed in the bathroom of an
underground club in NYC. However, the carefully crafted dioramas revealed themselves in an
orderly and linear fashion. The intimacy of these scenes forced you to get up close and inspect the
small details of each composition, as though each one was its own looking glass into Wonderland
and the viewer became Alice. The link between the phallic nature of the mud sculptures in the
smaller gallery and the vacant room with an overabundance of holes created a witty dynamic that
tied the work together.
Photo of Silver Moonscape. Photo courtesy of the artist.
Compositionally tight, each tableau scene included an overabundance of natural elements,
including trees, shrubbery, mushrooms, and allusions to the sun. With the attention to detail
demonstrated within the scenes, I could’ve been convinced that a 19th century realist painter was
the mastermind behind them. The formal qualities of a painting were hyper-prevalent, so much so
that I was looking for evidence of brushstrokes. Because of their sheer perfection, they felt
fabricated. Tree branches were placed in exactly the correct places, mushrooms usually filled the
foreground, and the placement of the horizon line gave Jacobs the ability to highlight some of
these aspects by making them stand out against a stark white sky. The fantastical qualities of
these works added to their illusion.
Red Moonrise. Image courtesy of the artist.
When I entered into the subsequent gallery, the reason for the separation of the other work from
the installation became immediately clear to me. The mud and stick sculptures found on the
pedestals sitting in the middle of the room possessed the raw and loose qualities that weren’t
apparent within the installation. The mark of the hand became apparent in the phallic mud
sculptures. The raunchy sexual innuendos of the sculptures made me think of the loose nature of
graffiti and street art, as if Basquiat worked in sculpture. The natural elements are reinforced
through the mud which was then casted in bronze, making a usually temporary structure
permanent. I realized that the theme of perseverance and permanence of the natural world rang
throughout the entire exhibition.
Jacobs’ installation mixed with his flat works and bronze casted sculptures spoke to the idea of
temporality. With his highly constructed fantastical scenes, the viewer can only witness them to
their full effect by standing in one particular spot in the structure. The intentional nature
of these works were crafted to exist as they are in a specific span of time; after that time has
passed, the illusion will be gone as they are deconstructed. This contrasted with the state of his
bronze sculptures and flat works, which will continue to exist in the state they are in even
after the conclusion of the exhibition. Jacobs cut no corners to make the viewer aware that they
are experiencing a temporary illusion as they move throughout the space.
Nocturnes runs through March 2nd at the KCAI Crossroads Gallery: Center for Contemporary Practice.