This text is perhaps less of a curatorial essay than it is a set of short comments on how to approach the works gathered in this show. 

trinket was designed with the premise that a small object could be infused with large meaning; that it could condense the intent, ideas, or impulses of a broader practice in a tiny gesture. It was thought of as a place where substance could be held in the palm of a hand and where art could further embrace its potential for lightness and mobility without forgoing rigor as an aim. 

Keepsakes often retain a sensorial and emotional evocative power. While rarely considered to have inherent, absolute value, they remind their owner of a moment, a place, a state of mind that triggers a compulsion to keep. 

There are over 90 works in trinket, made (mostly) under 2 x 2 x 2 inches, by (mostly) living artists, (mostly) in the habit of making at a far larger scale. The intentions behind each vary. Some embrace the potential of a life on the go, from a pocket or a bag; others are fragile, requiring a small protective case. A few operate at a point of friction, their materials questioning what and who is authorized or able to freely roam.

The selection is heterogeneous, a deeply personal constellation combining artists at very different career stages, working in a wide range of mediums and from wildly different geographies: friends, artists I’ve looked up to from afar or met through residencies and projects in the Philippines, Mexico, New York and beyond. Their ages range from 7 to 76. For some, it’s a first showing, while others have had multiple institutional surveys. Some saw the prompt as a formal exercise or challenge; others as a welcome moment of experimental play. 

While each work is presented in the gallery on custom handmade tiny shelves or prongs akin to numismatic displays, a microsite, trinket.art, allows viewers to further explore them true to scale, with companion writing—a word, a poem, a short essay—by their maker. 

In the end, while this show may open reflections on what it means to live and move with art, I think it is, at its core, about the transient potential—or lack thereof—of objects and beings, and the value a memory or thought, crystallized in a shareable gesture, can hold.

This tiny idea took on a life of its own and would not have been possible without the efforts of those who carried works on behalf of artists, without the generosity of the friend who received the pieces sent through the mail while I was away, without our fantastic fabricator who made sure each object would be intentionally held, and without the partnership of Parent Company.