The Center for Ongoing Research & Projects

Aspen Mays

Ships That Pass in the Night

April 27th - June 28th, 2013

Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing,
Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness;
So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another,
Only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence.

– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Tales of a Wayside Inn

From April 27th through May 25th, Aspen Mays will transform the The Center for Ongoing Research & Projects space at 990 1/2 West 3rd Avenue into a beacon. Drawing on real-time satellite feeds of maritime positioning data, custom software will determine when and where two ships “pass in the night” in Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. A panel of bright lights will flash, illuminating COR&P and signaling these serendipitous moments. A printer in the space will record the names of the ships and their locations. Landlocked Columbus becomes a distant witness to these events in the open ocean.

About the Artist

Aspen Mays grew up in Charleston, South Carolina. She graduated with an MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2009, and she holds a BA in Anthropology and Spanish from The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. In 2006, she was awarded a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship for study in Cape Town, South Africa. More recently, honors include a Fulbright Fellowship at the University of Chile, Santiago in 2010. She has exhibited her work nationally and internationally in New York at Golden Gallery, in Chicago at The Museum of Contemporary Photography and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Her work has been reviewed in Art Forum, Art Papers, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. Aspen Mays recently joined the faculty at The Ohio State University as an Assistant Professor of Art.