Autumn 2012

Ilya Isupov created "Autumn," and though the year is not known, he was born in 1971, so we know this is a modern piece. The whimsicality of the scene pulls at our nostalgia for folk art and fairy tales. This work seems to exist at the nexus of technology and nature. The surveyor, hard at work, stands in contrast to the couple, one holding some kind of measuring rod. A home or campsite sits behind them. Overhead, we see the inner workings of an anthill, tunnels and chambers, as if laid bare for observation. The ants themselves carry on with their work, unaware of the observers, either human or us. Here, Isupov sets up binaries between inside and out, man and nature, technology and wilderness. He uses an almost naive style to set us at ease, to ask us to consider the ways we impose ourselves on the natural world.