Glassine bags are grease, air, and water resistant bags with a variety of uses, but the ones that you might find on the ground most likely contained marijuana, cocaine, or heroin. What was most surprising to me during Tom Fruin‘s talk last night at Real Art Ways was how many people in the audience either did not know what glassine bags are commonly used for or had not seen them littering the sidewalks in Hartford. This was particularly surprising to me because Connecticut has “ranked first in the nation for the rate of heroin-related treatment admissions per 100,000 population,” and Hartford has had the most admissions of cities in Connecticut. Whenever I walk anywhere, I see glassine bags, and it does not matter whether I’m in a “bad area” or in a nicer one. Fruin had collected bags along his walk to the gallery, and the number he had again made me a bit confused as to how people from around here could never have noticed these littering the ground. The picture to the left shows bags he found while in Hartford yesterday.
Fruin’s American Landscapes exhibit is on display at Real Art Ways until November 16. It features used beer cans and glassine bags found in New York City. That sounds kind of dull, right? Well, he arranges the bags into patterns and sews them to form quilts or flags. Standing close to the piece, you can see residue like seeds, and images/words stamped onto individual baggies. The beer cans–mostly Bud–have been cut open and arranged into mountainous shapes. One wall features a church made from these cans. On the cans, he uses marker and paint to create hooded figures (klansmen). By juxtaposing neon lights with the klan iconography, the viewer is left with an eerie, uncomfortable feeling.
Fruin explained that by turning the drug baggies into quilts or flags, he was playing with the idea of how addictive substances offer a kind of “warmth” or “security” to the user. In particular, certain brands/stamps might be comforting to the user who has had previous experience with that label.
The next artist talk scheduled for Real Art Ways is with Carol Padberg on December 4th. This is a free event.
