For John Greer, civilizations are like distant islands immersed in a sea of time. He developed an early interest in how memory and the human tendency to shape forms into symbolic ideotypes (regardless of culture) result in the repeated creation of certain typologies. Past civilizations become instruments for his imagination. The act of reconfiguring aspects of the past, and of nature, forms the basis for an art that engages our sense of identity and our place in the world while also breaking molds—those constructs that we consider unchangeable. Greer’s dialogue is not really with civilizations ancient and modern (or postmodern), but with how we build meanings and structures for representation, only to consolidate perceptual stereotypes that close us off from the moment, the perpetual flux between interiority and surface…see the entire article in the print version of June’s Sculpture magazine.
