“Rest a spell.”(2024)
Makeshift spell quilt constructed of donated and discarded blankets, 4 generations of family quilting bits, privacy film for windows, duct tape, thread, pink rose petals, tiny glimmers and moss.
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“The city interprets and applies the ordinances to permit non homeless people to rest on blankets in public parks, while a homeless person who does the same thing breaks the law....The only question...is whether there is any meaningful difference between a law that says being homeless is punishable and a law that says being homeless while breathing, sleeping or blinking is punishable.”Oral argument from City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson Supreme Court of the United States April 22, 2024
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Makeshift spell quilt constructed of donated and discarded blankets, 4 generations of family quilting bits, privacy film for windows, duct tape, thread, pink rose petals, tiny glimmers and moss.
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“The city interprets and applies the ordinances to permit non homeless people to rest on blankets in public parks, while a homeless person who does the same thing breaks the law....The only question...is whether there is any meaningful difference between a law that says being homeless is punishable and a law that says being homeless while breathing, sleeping or blinking is punishable.”Oral argument from City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson Supreme Court of the United States April 22, 2024
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Protection Spell from Patriots (2024)
glycerine soap, 50 dried wisteria flowers surreptitiously taken from a police station parking lot near Liberty, NC, 41 unhinged safety pins and grounded glitter dust from the destroyed iPhone of a US citizen falsely accused online of leading an alleged domestic terrorism organization, bright white light.
This spell conjures a reexamination of legal doctrines such as unclean hands, due process, fruit of the poisonous tree and the Patriot Act, all allegedly enacted to “protect” so-called American citizens, for the purposes manifesting protections against so-called “Patriots.”
All of the materials presented have dueling uses and interpretations. For example, glycerine is used as a soap to clean, but also used in making explosives. Safety pins can help attach, or can draw blood, when the safety mechanism have become unhinged. Wisteria is known for its beauty and for deepening intuition, yet it is also invasive and toxic, for example, if ingested. Cell phones, made in part with quartz crystals, allow for communication and community building, yet also serve as evidence of our most intimate thoughts that can easily be used and abused against us in unjust and illegal ways, even in light of legal safety “protections” embedded in our systems of jurisprudence, themselves crafted as legalized spells for us from previous “Patriots.”
glycerine soap, 50 dried wisteria flowers surreptitiously taken from a police station parking lot near Liberty, NC, 41 unhinged safety pins and grounded glitter dust from the destroyed iPhone of a US citizen falsely accused online of leading an alleged domestic terrorism organization, bright white light.
This spell conjures a reexamination of legal doctrines such as unclean hands, due process, fruit of the poisonous tree and the Patriot Act, all allegedly enacted to “protect” so-called American citizens, for the purposes manifesting protections against so-called “Patriots.”
All of the materials presented have dueling uses and interpretations. For example, glycerine is used as a soap to clean, but also used in making explosives. Safety pins can help attach, or can draw blood, when the safety mechanism have become unhinged. Wisteria is known for its beauty and for deepening intuition, yet it is also invasive and toxic, for example, if ingested. Cell phones, made in part with quartz crystals, allow for communication and community building, yet also serve as evidence of our most intimate thoughts that can easily be used and abused against us in unjust and illegal ways, even in light of legal safety “protections” embedded in our systems of jurisprudence, themselves crafted as legalized spells for us from previous “Patriots.”
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Ashley Hollan is an intermedia storyteller, entertainment and civil rights lawyer and educator.Through jurisprudent witchery and aesthetic advocacy, Ashley’s audiovisual spell work illuminates hidden histories and interrogates legal quandaries to shift perspectives and disrupt dystopian outcomes. Through supernatural interventions considering court cases and current events, Ashley’s multidisciplinary practice calls into question accepted institutional norms, always implicating the audience, making artistic arguments to inspire awareness and activism.Ashley earned her BA in Public Policy and Visual Art/Art History at Duke University, attended law school at the University of Denver and graduated from Pacific Northwest College of Art with her MFA in VisualStudies and MA in Critical Studies. She currently serves as a Visiting Professor of Arts Administration andArt at Elon University.
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