Husband vs. Wife redux at Grizzly Grizzly

On Friday I checked in at Grizzly Grizzly to see Tim Eads’ and Tiernan Alexander’s Husband vs. Wife in its final state before the show closed. The premise was simple: each took one half of the gallery for an independent installation; after the opening reception, they would meddle with the other’s work (see the first post here). The end product is even more of a bonanza than the original installation. There’s frosting on the walls and furniture dangling up in the air. The relative orderliness of the installation’s first state has been upended.

Being in a relationship, we come to know our partners intimately, which begs the question: did the couple instinctively do things that they knew would get the other’s goat? I would have to estimate that they played nicely, because nothing too destructive took place. As Tim pointed out during my first visit, the idea was to improve upon or make “better” the other’s work. He said this tongue-in-cheek, but revealed a truth about the process. If anything, the second phase of the project is more like curation than it is creation.