Straight Lines in Four Directions For Social Distancing (after Sol LeWitt)
Yumi Janairo Roth
Marks for social distancing serve as a visual reminder of the coronavirus as well as the new minimum distance we must keep between ourselves and other people. They are also a form of drawing uniquely indicative of our current moment. Yumi Janairo Roth has repurposed Sol LeWitt’s 1973, Straight Lines in Four Directions and All Their Possible Combinations for a time of social distancing. Sol LeWitt, well known for introducing the idea of instruction-based art, is a founder of conceptual art practice. For the most part, however, his works have existed within the confines of traditional art museums and galleries. Janairo Roth’s project reimagines Lewitt’s works as a new form of instruction, for standing and waiting as well as creating and maintaining spaces between ourselves to keep each other safe.
Straight Lines in Four Directions For Social Distancing (after Sol LeWitt), 2020 is a temporary installation; Roth's work, installed in front of MECA&D now, will wear away with time.
Yumi Janairo Roth was born in Eugene, OR and raised in Chicago and suburban Washington DC. She currently lives and works in Boulder, Colorado where she is a professor or sculpture at the University of Colorado. Roth has created a diverse body of work that explores ideas of immigration, hybridity, and displacement through discrete objects and site-responsive installations, solo projects as well as collaborations. In her projects, objects function as both natives and interlopers to their environments, simultaneously recognizable and unfamiliar to their users. She received a BA in anthropology from Tufts University, a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts-Boston and an MFA from the State University of New York-New Paltz.
Yumi Janairo Roth has created a diverse body of work that explores ideas of immigration, hybridity, and displacement through discrete objects and site-responsive installations, solo projects as well as collaborations. Roth has exhibited and participated in artist-in-residencies nationally and internationally, including Sara Meltzer Gallery, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Smack Mellon, and Cuchifritos in New York City, Lawndale Art Center in Houston, Museum of Contemporary Art in Denver, Soap Factory in Minneapolis, Consolidated Works in Seattle, Ayala Museums in Manila, and Frankfurter Kunstverein in Frankfurt among others.