Installation view of “Desire Repair, ” untitled photomontage mounted on found suitcases, and an untitled text on canvas piece in a group show at Red Ink Studios, San Francisco, California, 2006.

The photomontage mounted in the suitcases (which I can’t remember the title of) was an effort to break out of the picture plane. Since doing the photems (which were mounted flush with the edge of the supports), I was uncomfortable with frames and support mechanisms, things that are meant to clean up the image, as they created a second boundary in addition to that of the image. Something about the suitcases made more sense, since they’re designed to contain things, but only temporarily and for a purpose. Frames have two functions: to physically protect an image and to create a hard conceptual boundary between the art and the world. It’s the latter that didn’t work with the images I was making, partly because they weren’t meant to stand by themselves, but in groups. Sadly, someone at the opening spilled a glass of wine across the whole piece, so it has not survived.