The Hole
Artist
I’m an interdisciplinary visual artist who often repurposes and re-contextualizes ordinary objects and images. I prefer to use materials headed for the trash and to employ backgrounds, margins and the reorientation of the gaze that centres on a secondary product: something produced incidentally during the production or activation of something else. I’m fascinated by our universal reliance and obsession with photography to document and disseminate all the aspects of our lives, both professional and personal.
I’m also intrigued how a simple act, like looking at one’s surroundings through a hole in a card can isolate the ordinary aspects of our lives, creating new narratives to engage with.
This provocation is inspired by an instruction by the artist Yoko Ono called A Hole to See the Sky Through. Ono frequently uses instructions to engage the viewer to look and think more profoundly.
Kelly Lycan is a photo-based installation artist who resides in Vancouver, BC, Canada on the traditional and unceded territories of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), səl’ilwətaɁɬ (Tsleil- Waututh) and xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations. Lycan’s work investigates the way objects and images are placed and displayed in the world and the cycle of value they experience. She employs photography and sculpture in order to engage them beyond medium specificity. Lycan received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Nova Scotia College of Art and Design and a Master of Fine Arts from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Los Angeles. Her work has been exhibited across Canada, the US, Europe, and the Middle East, including solo exhibitions at Burnaby Art Gallery (2024), Ag Galerie, Tehran, Iran (2018); Burrard Art Foundation, Vancouver (2016); Susan Hobbs Gallery, Toronto (2015-16); Presentation House Gallery, North Vancouver (2014); SFU Gallery, Burnaby (2014); Or Gallery, Vancouver (2011); and Gallery TPW, Toronto (2009). Lycan also collaborated from 2005-2015 with the artist collective Instant Coffee, a service-oriented artist collective that have exhibited widely.
Kelly Lycan
Create a maquette of an object.
Invitation
Cut out a 4” x 6” piece of card stock, white or off-white. Safely cut a round hole into the card about a 1⁄2” in diameter. It does not have to be a perfect circle. You can use a utility or X-acto knife to cut the hole.
With a camera or a phone, take photographs examining your neighbourhood through the hole. Consider the hole a cinematic device allowing you to see your surroundings differently. Document as you explore. You can include just the hole; the hole and the card; the hole, the card, and your hand. Try different methods. There is no incorrect way to do this.
Find an image you connect with, an image that has a subject you could feasibly recreate as a miniature object (a maquette or model). It could be a tree, a house, an urban collection of objects. Use any materials you have at hand, for example, cardboard, paper, twist ties, chopsticks, etc.
Create the object at a scale smaller than the original. When something is described as “to scale,” it represents an object as a smaller or larger version of itself. I find using a scale where 1 inch = 1 foot is manageable. For example if your object is 5 feet high your miniature would be 5 inches high. It does not have to be exact. You can also just wing it and use any scale you want.
Using the same card with the hole, replicate your original photograph. You will need to consider the background and lighting of your miniature and the card.