The Mattress Factory

I would like to begin by saying I enjoyed my first matress factory experience, it was an enlightening one. Upon my arrival I felt a sense that I had been there before thanks to the good people at Google. The neighborhood and buildings surrounding the mattress factory give you a feeling of culture rooted deep in this cities history.

The exhibit that struck me as most interesting (and forgive me I wrote the artist name down lost it and this particular exhibit isn't featured on the Mattress Factory website) It was a large dark room with a door centered at the far end with a rich red light shining through, the room extended about 40 feet and it had about an 3-4 inches of water covering about 90% of the rooms floor. This room envoked so many different feelings, fear because of the extreme darkness,curiousity,and the smells of the water in the room. The first thing that came to mind (which may sound weird) was Dante's Inferno. I had a vision of the red doorway being hell and the water that lie before us was the river of Acheron, for those who aren't aware this is the mythological river dividing the world of the living and the world of the dead.

There were several other exhibits I enjoyed such as the first room in the technology building Jacob and Jessica Ciocci, there was just so much going with the sights, and sounds. I recall several people actually mentioning they felt sick in Antoine Catala's exhibit titled Pumpkins. It was the room where the visual images projected on the wall were broken down into pixelation.

Overall I would have to say my first experience with installation art was a good one I really enjoyed the feeling of standing inside the work, and given the opportunity I would reccomend the mattress factory to anyone interested in art.