Life+Times Presents: Dan Colen, A Retrospective

“Drugs, Hugs and Bugs,” 2004-2005, Mixed media, 9ft x 8 ft x 8ft

“I feel that I could talk about this piece endlessly. Similar to the brick wall, the original inspiration for this piece came from places that groups of people believe in and choose to congregate around. I borrowed the design of a wooden structure that I first saw in a Jeff Wall photograph (“Vampires Picnic”). In his photo, it was where the vampires gathered. In my sculpture, I refashioned it to seem more like a place I remembered sneaking off to when I was a teenager to drink Soco and Schnapps, smoke weed, eat mushrooms, and make out with girls. This is the kind of place where you have your first conversations about the universe and the meaning of life. I filled this sculpture with what I felt were the contents of my life at the time: ‘Drugs, Hugs and Bugs.’ I remember feeling that there was a type of magic collected inside of that crate. I like to imagine that I think about this sculpture in the same way that John McCracken thought about his sculptures.”