Information is proud to present our inaugural exhibition POND THEORY. A solo exhibition by Jacob C Hammes. The show will be open April 13th at Information located at 2024 E Westmoreland St. Philadelphia, PA 19135

In Hammes’ recent work, the idea of monument is explored with a perverted bluntness, with precarious fountains spitting water; cast concrete blocks featuring quotes, jokes, and aphorisms; motivational posters making ominous declarations, and kinetic sound-sculptures as time-keeping devices.

Within the familiar framework of monument as an object to commemorate, memorialize, and preserve, Hammes refocuses attention on its ability to hypnotize, tranquilize, satirize, mourn, and aestheticize political experience. In this instance, an uneasy connection between time and labor are examined in an allegorical narrative discussing a theory of ponds and fountains as industrial soothsayer. Delivered in a frustratingly soothing business-speak, the text and audio narration of pond theory is indeterminate, allowing humor, absurdity, and perverse material relationships to develop – the pond becomes a tool of manipulation for the production of intimacy between business and client, in a satire exposing anxieties over labor alienation, social unrest, climate change, and sublime encounters with nature.

Jacob C Hammes is an interdisciplinary artist, arts organizer, and educator based in Philadelphia. Hammes holds a 2015 MFA from the Tyler School of Art and a 2004 BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He is the director and curator of Pilot + Projects, a small artist-run exhibition space, and teaches at Tyler School of Art & University of the Arts. Hammes has shown at spaces such as the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Woodmere Art Museum, the Grunwald Gallery at Indiana University, The Hills Aesthetic Center, Temple Contemporary, The Hyde Park Art Center, the Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts, and the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.