“I love installation, so that pops up from time to time in my work. My first project in Arizona was an installation in 2002 on Grand Avenue for the Stop ‘N Look window, and my last big installation—called POOL – An Immersive Installation—was in 2015 at Eye Lounge. For that work, I built a pool inside the gallery with sloped walls, a glowing light fixture, a metal ladder, and a sunning deck. I also created an underwater film, which was projection-mapped onto the interior surface of the pool. The experience began as you walked in the door. You were walking into the deep end of a pool, submerged in moving water imagery and surrounded by aquatic sounds. This was a very exciting and fulfilling project outside my primary painting practice. ”
This unique site-specific piece, simply called Pool is an immersive environment that allows the viewer to experience the deep end of a pool without actually being in water. The artist, Abbey Messmer, is touching on the process for her preceding works, oil paintings based on underwater photographs that use water as a lens to transform subjects and highlight atypical perspectives. Abbey Messmer created the structure inside the gallery and shot and edited the video. Collaborating artist Mark Hughes spatially mapped the video on the surface of the 3-D pool structure.
