Light Boxes

By Chris Jeffrey

This box measures 9 ½ “ wide, 17 ½ “ high and 18” deep. On the inside the back, the floor and the two sides are mirror glass, and in the front the viewer looks in through a two-way mirror. There is a double pyramid structure made of wooden strips hanging from the ceiling, painted in blue fluorescent paint. A UV light at the top of the box makes the blue paint pop in vibrant color, which is then reflected into seeming infinity by the mirrors.

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In the January/February 2019 edition of Art New England Online, writer S. Scarlett Moberly describes this infinity light box in these terms:

The beguiling Blue Infinity Box by Chris Jeffrey first appears to be a well-crafted wooden box solidly situated atop a chest-height plinth. Its plainness from the approach however is almost interactive, as one instinctively knows there must be more. Rounding the perimeter of the plinth to solve this unspoken riddle, the author wondered what she might find. Would it be a shadowbox in the vein of Joseph Cornell, or a more like one of Frances Glessner Lee’s doll-sized dioramas? The answer is both and neither. Contained within this vessel is a glimpse into an alternate universe. Stacked in the center is a pyramid of fluorescent blue squares, part alien, part Mesoamerican. Bathed in UV light, the pyramid is reflected in the mirrors that line the sides and bottom of the box, repeating different perspectives of the otherworldly visage into eternity. Hovering above the pyramid is the light source, a halo of violet circles not unlike sci-fi illustrations of the lights from alien aircraft. Without any interpretation provided, the visitor is left to her own devices to decide the artist’s intent. Is this a commentary on the origins of our planet, akin to the legends of ancient societies interacting with extraterrestrials, or is this simply an exercise in light, space and form? Fans of Ancient Aliens will certainly lean one way, cynics, the other.

For the full article, which features an in-depth description of The Front Gallery in Montpelier, where I am a member artist, click here.