When updated in real time, the phrase’s unsettling ambiguities become abundantly clear: Is it the now that keeps changing, or the change that keeps changing? Does the artist call us to change, or is she merely reporting it? “I look at it positively,” says Grimyser, “It can be interpreted in different ways, but to me, ‘Forever will I cross now out’ is the same as ‘I will continue to write another now.’” Every failure of change is an invitation to change. The end of one moment and the beginning of another are bound up in the same gesture.
With Change is Now, as well as with many of her other recent pieces involving text, Grimyser says that the phrase came to mind more readily than the accompanying image. “When I have something that I know is working, it’s very immediate. This one was a waterfall effect. I had been working with that sentence, and the visual, or photographic, part came together fairly quickly.”
Grimyser, who currently lives and works in New York City, spent the last two months completing an artist-in-residence grant, specializing in book arts, at the Women’s Studio Workshop in Rosendale, where she taught silkscreening to Kingston High School’s AP Art class. While there, she also completed her own handmade artist’s book (involving silkscreen printing, photography, and crafting a hard cover).
Portfolio: www.jennifergrimyser.com.