FOSEL features artist Eric Knudsen whose work is informed by his experience in Provincetown and his need to create art that draws attention to larger social and political issues.
Eric Knudsen, until recently a South End resident, lived in Provincetown between 2011 and 2015, during which time he took classes at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum (PAAM) and at the Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill. He absorbed the energy of the historic artist colony with its many galleries and practicing artists, and the magic of living by the ocean. His work is informed both by his experience in Provincetown and by his compulsion to create art that draws attention to larger social and political issues.
The designs on display here were inspired, in part, by the themed costume parties regularly held in Provincetown, including the annual Carnival parade. In the Tampini series, he attempts to leverage the attention-grabbing quality of costume to spark conversations about identity, waste, and the environment.
Often on his walks along the beach in Provincetown Knudsen would come upon trash tangled with organic debris at the high tide line and feel a sense of dismay. “Among the human-made garbage were small missile-like plastic objects that I learned were tampon applicators that had been flushed down the toilet. I was drawn to the applicators for their sleek, smooth design; they looked like part of a sea creature,” he said.
Tampini was created to be both beautiful and shocking, juxtaposing the quotidian with the disastrous. Knudsen points out that although menstruation is a natural bodily process, its management has been commodified by corporations with devastating consequences to the environment. The plastic tampon applicators, like all plastics discarded into the sea, end up in the digestive tracts of marine creatures or are degraded into small pieces that eventually enter the human food chain.
In April 2019, the Tampini artwork was featured in the Period Pop Up Art Show in Jamaica Plain sponsored by the Massachusetts chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW). The show was intended to draw attention to the state I AM bill (H.1959/ S.1274) that would guarantee equitable access to menstrual products (preferably biodegradable ones!) for people in prisons, schools, and homeless shelters. The show was also exhibited in the Massachusetts State House in September of that year.*
In addition to his interest in art, Knudsen has a background in public health and has worked in HIV prevention. In 2011, he began volunteering at a summer camp for transgender and non-binary/gender-non-conforming youth, where he since has become an associate director. Identifying as gay and queer, he lives in Jamaica Plain with his partner and their plants.
* For more information on the I AM movement, please visit http://www.massnow.org/IAM.