Typical Oasis. Solo exhibition at Corkin Gallery. November 2023-January 2024.

“Typical Oasis,” reads the caption to Figure I-12 in the 1993 edition of the US Department of the Army's Field Manual 90-3, Desert Operations (originally published with another caption in 1977).

In its many illustrations, the survival guide demonstrates an anxiety with vulnerability in colonial, territorial venture in a series of black and white, cartoonish vistas that mitigate a preoccupation with risk with easily Xeroxed, romantic depictions of landscape. Figure 1-12, “Typical Oasis,” depicts the provision of momentary hospitality in a supposedly hostile landscape, indicating opportunity amidst the danger of environment.

Typical Oasis is a solo exhibition that tests various means by which similar allusions—to risk and reward, to hazard and pleasure— might take place. The exhibition’s images and sculptures, the latter made of cardboard and gouache, develop an interest in vulnerability and survival, conscious of the military Field Manual that informs the work. Images common to popular depictions of military environments and wilderness, like cigarettes, tools, campfire, and shelter—recur among the objects arranged as an island in Corkin Gallery’s central space.