Jeanne Randolph
PARKING LOT PANDEMIC
Parking Lot Pandemic is an artist book created by Jeanne Randolph in conjunction with her exhibition of the same name at Paul Petro Contemporary Art, Toronto, Sept 3 – October 2nd 2021. In photographs and text, Randolph’s paripatetic musings focus on the early days of Covid. Walking through the empty streets of downtown she speculates on a tiny virus that has brought the populace to a standstill. As she says, ”I am intrigued by the idea that these tiny, tiny creatures, even viruses or germs, are not quite classified as living animals. It goes against the grain to portray something as tiny as a virus or an aphid as having their place and their consciousness in our everyday life.”
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“You might say “I am tiny.”
You are not alone being miniscule. Many wondrous things are tiny. Tiny is so often charming it may be hard to believe there could be tiny things that are not adorable. tiny implies pixies, snowflakes, the twinkling of stars, baby feet. Germs are also tiny.
Most people find germs unnerving. Seen through a microscope, germs probably look fascinating to medical students, but pictured in high school science books germs are ugly, even unnatural, compared to so many other larger animals. Tinier than germs are the wee viruses with intricate geometric shapes. Even Megavirus, the biggest virus yet, is actually extremely tiny, so tiny that millions of them could march on a germ.” Jeanne Randolph from Parking Lot Pandemic.
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“The generative idea in Parking Lot Pandemic is scale, how we perceive it and then how words and images alter those perceptions. Her measure engages both the immense and the tiny, text and photographs are the tools for that calibration. The opening sentences list immensities: oceons, the sky over Saskatchewan, the Grand Canyon.” From Border Crossings Issue # 157.
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Jeanne Randolph is one of Canada’s foremost cultural theorists. She is the author of the influential book Psychoanalysis & Synchronized Swimming (1991) as well as Symbolization and Its Discontents (1997), Why Stoics Box (2003), Ethics of Luxury (2007), Shopping Cart Pantheism (2015), Prairie Modernist Noir: The Disappearance of the Manitoba Telephone Booth (2018), and, most recently, My Claustrophobic Happiness. Dr. Randolph is also known for her curation and as an engaging lecturer, performance artist and musician. In universities and galleries across Canada, England, Australia, and Spain, she has spoken on topics ranging from the aesthetics of Barbie to the philosophy of Wittgenstein.
Title: PARKING LOT PANDEMIC
Artist: Jeanne Randolph
ISBN: 978-1-7777206-2-9
Publisher: flask
Limited Edition: 100 copies
Publication date: November 2021
Size: 6” W X 9” H X 2.5” D. 64 pages. Sewn binding, soft cover. Printed by Mitchell Press in Vancouver.