Rebecca Norton

Rebecca Norton, born 1981, received her BFA from the University of Louisville in 2004 and her MFA from Art Center College of Design in 2010. Norton's studio practice encompasses 2D and 3D design, collaboration, digital modeling, and animation. Her work examines theories of synthesis and connectivity as they relate to the activity of reconstructing reality in vision and thought. She takes a special interest in color theory and problems of the mathematical intelligibility of natural phenomena. Norton has exhibited nationally and internationally. She has been a contributing writer for The Brooklyn Rail, Arts in Bushwick and Abstract Critical. Rebecca Norton currently lives and works in Louisville, KY.

From The “Dioramas of the Metaverse: 118 Elliot Ave” series

In 2014, I was informed that my father had made the decision to move. The

house where I spent most of my childhood and early adult years was being

put on the market for sale. That Christmas, while on a “home for the holidays” vacation, I

decided to scan the interior of the house. This was the last documentation of our home before it was sold to new owners.

I returned to capture the yard and garage in the spring of 2015. The home scans were

composed together in Modo, a 3D modeling software. I approached the digitally modeled

house as if it were an object for time-based painting. Lights were added,

deformations animated, and surfaces manipulated to create optically

enticing, and sometimes supernatural, impressions of a place that continues to live in the collective memories of its past occupants. 

virtual home

the bones of a home are just its bones/ shifting creaking wooden slats

no furnishings would be/ too loud

surfaces arrange things/ fill in the shadows 

more is possible/ echo soft noises

An object of nostalgia and return/ as much about the past as it was the future 

it was a home/ I explored myself in these walls

touched it daily/ plaster skin for organs living within

Home/ partial-object animated 

we whispered to our house/ shaped it with our words

the virtual house/ now another possibility

again I can stretch/ bend the perpendicular walls

the cubes/ clusters stacked as:

bedrooms, closets, hallways, and bathrooms, 

living areas, dining, and laundry,

sunroom, kitchen, and garden.