Title: The Wilson Murder
Artist’s description:
“In 1992 Dr. Jack Wilson was murdered in his home in northern Alabama. The killer was apprehended, but suggested the idea came from Wilson’s wife and her twin sister. This work employs elements and strategies inherent to mediated constructs, emphasizing dichotomies and “doubles” and offering a differentiated set of elements that create an accessible narrative intended to help viewers reconstruct aspects of the event as evidenced through objects, crime scene photos and psuedo-biographical images.”
Additional information: www.Michael-Woody.com
Peer Reviews:
1
Riding the tails of the recent Casey Anthony trial, The Wilson Murder piece offers an obscure distance to a similar case with a rejuvenated relevance. The lower profile nature of the Wilson trial allows the viewer to bring less directly attached baggage to the piece, however with a similar set of events fresh in our minds we are ready to draw new conclusions and reflect on the parallels. The pieces emphasis on “doubles” also blends seamlessly into the recent controversy surrounding the Anthony trial. The timing and accessibility of this piece, combined with Michael’s general tendencies toward the study of knowledge, makes this an excellent fit for the show.
2
According to the artist’s description, the work seems to suggest that there is an existence of a crack between confirmed information and a reasonable doubt through the structure of one murdered event. However, instead of not only suggesting the possible meta-structure beyond the narrative, the manner of installation is talking about a potential flow of anger and the hysterical moment of violence….In this case, viewers clearly become a man who cannot understand these ‘mysteries and hysterical twins’…In terms of narrative, the structure of the work can be indicating future violence, as revenge, past as assailant, or both of them like Mobius strip. The women’s domestic photos are saying that they can possibly be victim as a woman prisoned at home, but also they can be a black widow spider after their witch ancestor. The anger is looking forward…The nicely laid down bat right near the pedestal leaves the power of justice in the hands of viewers. The work says ‘I am suggesting to you the possible truth that you can be angry and I am allowing you to act with this tool’. Like The Murders in the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe, the smile of two twins might be already very hysteric, like a symbol of killers, almost enough to let you have some desire to grip the bat.
