With spirits lifting, gas prices lowering and fun-employment escalating, and although it may not be the wisest of economic choices under the sun, the roads nonetheless seem paved with more possibility and promise. Thus maybe it’s time to dust off the thumb, tune up the hybrid engines and give that great American excursion one more try.
Exploring how the “trip takes us” instead of the other way around, the current Road Trip exhibition at the San Jose Museum of Art is devoted to this distinctly American rite of passage in which the journey is equally compelling to the destination. Road Trip (through January 25) examines the travel experience through photography, video, sculpture, and works on paper. Some artists methodically document their surroundings and search for remnants of their pasts, while others discard GPS, reinterpret maps and invent their own landscapes for their own imagined journeys, “which often entail not only a physical displacement but also a psychological and emotional passage.” Among the participants are Sophie Calle, Steven Deo, Lordy Rodriguez, Ed Ruscha, and Season 2 artist Eleanor Antin.
