nowhere is here

“Luminescence. Grains of sands. Relics of unknown origins and impossible futures. Monroe Isenberg transmutes mundane, human-crafted elements into reflections on the dance of time, the expanse of space, and the untamed essence of the natural realm. These sculptures ascend as monoliths, foreign yet intimately familiar. Through the alchemy of fusing, sanding, and even video projection-intricate connections are woven, resonating with the mystique of Nordic isles and the ever-shifting tapestry of environments in flux. Nowhere is truly here.

—Dakota Noot, Curator at Doyle Arts Pavilion

Nonolith
acrylic, refracted light
96″ x 22″ x 22″
2023

Referencing Kubrick’s 2001 Space Odyssey, Nonolith explores light’s relativistic qualities and was created to function as a relic from a future not yet in focus. Viewers experience the internal colors change and respond to their movement. This effect occurs completely naturally.

Skyline
cinderblock, plexiglass, refracted light
52″ x 18″ x 4″
2023

A tower of cinder supports a container emanating a spectrum of colors— a relationship between the physical and intangible unfolds. The cinderblocks allude to the built environment— the present, while the container references the sky and future. Their meeting point becomes a type of horizon.

Flatspace
acrylic, safety mirror
42″ x 58″ x 4″
2023

An obscured industrial remnant sits within a nondescript space a top two Pliocene sandstone rocks. Its weightlessness contrasts its placement on the ground. Appearing circular from the front, viewers discover the work is actually flat and disappears altogether from the side.

Green Shadow
Acrylic and pigment
45” x 50” x 4”
2023

The work studies various green shades and tints of plants. A color that can be rare in the desert. Diffusing and containing these pigments creates a shadow-like effect. Contextualized by the desert objects placed around the gallery, these green tonalities reference the change an environment can undergo and its potential to grow.

Aggregate
Pliocene sandstone, plastic, sand
10″ x 96″ x 12″
2023

Out of sand and sandstone emerge processed and raw plastic material. A subtle GLow emanates from within them. The sand outlines the shape of a coffin, shadow, or ray of light. Will these synthetic aggregates surface out from eroding lands in the distant future?

Horizon Disc 1
acrylic, pigment, cast paper, safety mirror
25″ x 25″ x 3.5″
2022

The horizon is further explored and manipulated into a sphere. Placing the work up high above references the history of the space and industrial artifact it once was.

A Different Arch
projection of water, time
variable dimensions
2022

A Different Arch is a 13-channel video of the sunset reflecting off the ocean in Bergen, Norway. Each section or ring (thirteen total) is a video of a different section of time— the outer sections are recorded earlier and the inner sections are recorded later. Overlaying these sections produces a portal-like moving image where color and time intertwine and the whole sunset can be experienced all at once. No colors were altered or manipulated during the production of the work.

A Blue Shadow
(Spectral Series)
acrylic, blue, cast paper
32″ x 32″ x 4.5″
2021

Blue Shadow is a relic produced from my memory of a hole. Specifically a depression in a melting Icelandic glacier. The piece explores the blueness that naturally emerges from this type of deep ice and the memories of a melting world that lay secret within these depths.

To produce the work’s color, the sunrise in Iceland was documented for three hours. Various blue tints were then carefully selected from the video and reproduced as hand-mixed pigment. The video referenced is Blue Sunrise.

nowhere is here (6)
handmade accordion fold sculpture and book
8″ x 8″ x 480″
2023

nowhere is here is an accordion fold book that was developed in conversation with Ed Roucha’s All the Buildings on the Sunset Strip. Sixty photographs were taken of the ocean in Skuløya, Norway over an hour. Each page is a photo of a minute in that hour. Every page appears different and the water’s subtle color changes become a marker of time.

Landkeeper
Project: Temporal Horizons: Between the Sky and Sea
Performance Duration 3.5 hours
Location: Ullahomen, Skuløya, Norway
Material: Fisherman suit, push broom made from gathered grass, driftwood, and a pine branch
Video: 5m 30s
2022

Landkeeper is an exercise in myth making and stems from questions like — How can we create new myths that serve as guides and lessons for generations to come? How are myths and the environment entangled? And how can new mythologies provide value systems and moral guidelines and develop cultural responsibilities that address the challenges we face today?

As a response to these questions, Landkeeper is a story of protection, maintenance, and explores sentiments of futility. It investigates the idea of the mythic landscape— asking how our interactions with land can connect us to and permeate a place and its material.