Eric Troffkin - Not Real - Opening Reception November 20, 2009

November 20 – December 19 2009
Opening Reception Friday November 20, 6 – 10 pm

Good Citizen Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of new sculptures and photographs
Eric Troffkin – NOT REAL

Eric Troffkin’s working process originates with his fascination with small everyday details that he senses have deeper meanings. The works for NOT REAL derived from the phenomenon of lens flare, the stray flashes of light that rebound inside a camera and result in ghostly geometric shapes appearing in photographs, film, and video. These beautiful appearances of light caught Troffkin’s eye and he soon began to notice them intentionally placed into films, videos and animations during post-production for dramatic effect and to add a sense of truthfulness to a scene. Even though they are “not real”, they attest to the presence, either actual or hypothetical, of a camera.

As a sculptor primarily concerned with the production of objects, Troffkin made it his goal to create “real” versions of lens flares and use them as the foundation elements for NOT REAL. The work for this exhibition utilizes these “real” lens flares, fabricated in the plastic and foam materials of film industry prop makers. These objects, realized in three-dimensions, are also the basis for a series of photographs. By creating “real” lens flares, Troffkin has re-interpreted their “original” cousins, whose reality does not belong in our actual three-dimensional world, but to an alternative world of recorded imagery.

Eric Troffkin is a sculptor working in Detroit, Michigan where he recently relocated from St. Louis to take the position of Assistant Professor in Sculpture at Wayne State University. Much of the work for NOT REAL was formulated and produced in St. Louis, where Troffkin was a Visiting Assistant Professor of Sculpture at Washington University. Prior to his position at Washington University, Troffkin was a Lecturer at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and has also worked as a model-maker, fabricating architectural models, product prototypes, and props for film and photography.