mel chin

  • Reverb

    Reverb


    2005
    proposal

    Concept materials for a museum-grounds landscape project, commissioned by the University of Texas, Austin campus. Not built.

    Responding to a city split by geology and social and economic differences, Chin proposed a landscape project as a way to catalyze a desire to transgress the invisible borders set up by race and class. He surveyed every public park in the city to select distinctive landscape elements that were to become “found landscapes.” These elements would be replicated exactly and placed on the University campus, along with live sound feeds from the original sites. Unique physical and auditory experiences from found landscapes in diverse locations were projected to be experiential fulcrums for curiosity and discovery.






  • Untitled History

    Untitled History


    2005
    Indiana limestone, Texas limestone
    size variable

    A Sculpture in five parts for the City of Corpus Christi on the grounds of the new Arena and Convention Center and the Art Museum of South Texas.

    The sculpture consists of five traditional outdoor pedestals, each supporting a fragment of a figurative statue, which collectively add up to a complete body. Mounted as remains, they evoke Greco-Roman sculpture fragments found throughout the museum world. Taken as a whole, they represent a composite body of Texas history.
            – A dog looks up to what would have been a statue, its vanished
              master, a Karankawa Indian. The feet remain.
            – A 16th Century Spanish gauntlet.
            – The dress of an Irish immigrant from the1820’s.
            – A torso fragment of an African American cowboy.
            – An oil field worker’s helmet from the 1930’s.








  • Polycentric Multi-Polar Paradigm

    Polycentric Multi-Polar Paradigm


    2005
    oil on steel
    44 x 44 inches

    This painting is a physical manifestation of arcane military language made graphic and ephemeral. Saudi Arabia, China, and the United States are the poles. The pink in the painting represents the relative population, green equals military budget, and white veils suggest the influence of ideology.

  • WMD

    WMD


    2005
    singlewide trailer frame, 92 Ford Taurus® engine and split chassis, plywood, wood, rubber, roofing material, plastic, vinyl siding, singlewide trailer accessories
    10 x 71 x 8 feet

    Full scale Replica of a U.S. Peacekeeper nuclear missile remade as a Warehouse of Mass Distribution with shelving to hold food and clothing. Design influences were the singlewide trailer, desert storm camouflage, and the U.S. presentation of a case for war at the U.N. Made with students at East Tennessee State University.


  • Terrapine Carolina (Hillbilly Armor)

    Terrapine Carolina (Hillbilly Armor)


    2005
    steel frame, found materials
    180 x 96 x 30 inches

    “You go to war with the army you have.” – Donald Rumsfeld

    Custom-fit, handmade armor, from North Carolina and Tennessee junk, for the underbelly of a U.S. Army Humvee.



  • Rafetus Euphraticus

    Rafetus Euphraticus


    2005
    steel, tulle, silk, fine Parisian lace
    33 x 23 x 9 inches

    Fancy lingerie with arabesque patterns, one French, one Iraqi, scantily protect a dying species.