Aiden Cole

Artist Statement

This place is found by word of mouth. Bored teenagers haul furniture and built fires to habitate the small, hidden stretch of land, cut through by a river surrounded by mud and trees. When my brother brought me there for the first time. "Let me show you something cool"—I was struck by the scene before me. The cover to an air conditioning unit, a tennis ball trapped between rocks, a rusting metal bridge, and a recliner upturned in the water—the strange mingling of worlds fascinated me for reasons I couldn't place, and I was compelled to visit this isolated pocket of the world many times after that. With each visit, the landscape was transformed before me. The recliner disappeared to be replaced with an exercise bike, unsteady in the mud. A crushed soda can wedged solidly in between two tree branches. The river took on winding paths to get to its destination around various manmade items stuck in the earth.

The odd dance between man and nature kept me coming back until my final visit. I rode along the line of bushes with my bike to find the entrance and was met with a small gravel trail. It led to a flattened dirt lot site where the hideout used to be—where it had been erased from existence. Trees had been uprooted and replaced with hulking construction equipment, and a sign was driven deep into the ground—an announcement of the upcoming building complex to be developed.

Recliner in the River was painted in an attempt to capture the feeling of the curious mix between two opposites, but since its destruction, the lost moment takes me back to that construction lot just as easily. I see the river power, and blink against the sun drying out the trampled, cracking dirt bed. I shiver from the chill of the shade the trees provide, and feel my skin prickle, unprotected from the burning heat.

I watch the recliner against the current, and see the cushioned leather seat of a bulldozer parked among the dust.

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