ERIC von ROBERTSON: PROTOTYPES-EXCURSIONS-OBSERVATIONS
For the past several years, Robertson has pursued his work under the conceptual framework of CARL — 
The Center for the Advancement of Recreation and Leisure. As Robertson says, CARL is an organization and process. This process consists of developing multiple functions within one structure and synthesizing it into a recreational prototype. The prototype is then introduced to a series of field studies that investigate the structure’s ability to transform according to its location or recreational context.” Thus CARL’s output — whether sculpture, installation, or digital ephemera — is viewed as prototypes for recreation and leisure activities that viewers are encouraged to participate in.
For PROTOTYPES-EXCURSIONS-OBSERVATIONS, Paragraph and CARL will facilitate a series of exchanges, both in the gallery and in the community, that will offer the public a chance to interact with these prototypes and to experience novel social platforms. For CARL, it is imperative that the control towers of the exhibition space be destabilized — that the exchange between the gallery and the sites of recreation and leisure become fluid. As Robertson says, the work enables “traveling to the proximity of leisure not through reference, but an actual situation.” Only as one realizes that these objects are designed to function in numerous contexts, and that the gallery space is interchangeable with CARL’s other chosen sites (the Arizona desert, the Costa Rican shoreline, a potted forest tableaux within IKEA, downtown Kansas City bus stops), is the real potential of CARL’s activity made apparent. These works emphasize the creative process over the finished product and the ephemeral over the permanent. Rather than giving primacy to the art object, the gallery and the field become spaces for contemplation, social interaction, and free-spirited excursions.
Among the planned events are 12 fl oz. excursions, where participants will be able to cruise the streets of Kansas City with soda cans precariously affixed to the roof of their car. A picnic with the gentle load is sure to delight all generations — this shape-shifting piece of inflatable architecture will have you cloud-gazing one moment and your heart outpaced the next. The gallery will also offer a rental scheme for objects in the exhibit and an ongoing membership program in CARL that is, of course, mutually beneficial.