by Karen Moss

topography
1) the art or practice of graphic delineation in detail of natural and man-made features of a place or region especially in a way to their relative positions and elevation
2) the physical or natural features of an object or entity and their structural relationships

In these traditional definitions from Webster's Dictionary the word "topography" refers to the creation of a metaphorical equivalent in words of a specific, physical landscape. Most often the meaning of topography refers to the representation of a landscape according to some conventional signs or systems of mapping (ie: a topographic map.) With the permutation of language and its shifting significance prevalent in post-modern thought of recent years, the idea of topography as a singular, fixed entity has blurred into a realm of multi-valent meanings of many topographies. The more limited definition of topography used by cartographers and geographers may now be found in diverse contexts ranging from art and architecture to medicine and metallurgy, or realms of science and technology. The very concept of a singular definition of topography, therefore, has evolved into multiple spatial configurations and broken through boundaries of discrete disciplines.

This exhibition will present artists who work with the ideas about different topographies or whose subject can be considered under the general rubric of the "topographical." Less about the traditional genres of landscape or cityscape, their representations are about specific localities and/or senses of place. Including both natural and man-made subjects, the rural and the urban, some topographical works refer to a location in "real" space, while others are fictional. Traversing across definitions and disciplines and media, artists are using divergent materials and media to represent their various topographies, which range from the literal to the conceptual. The artists all share an interest in some kind of mapping, marking, siting, place-making, and an obsession with the aesthetics of surface or space, which are often rendered in abstract, constructed, imagined, invented, or even "hyperreal."

Their work ranges from more traditional and physical topographies related to geography or cartography, to topographical mappings of cultural, social/psychological spaces. Some are tangible and grounded in a precise location or space, while others are fantasized, imagined or projected. Temporally, these topographical expressions are memories of the things past, firmly anchored in the present, or looking toward the future; the artists use time and space to construct meaning for their own respective topographies.