To make the 26 multilayered assemblages in “Notes on the State of Virginia,” Suzanne Stryk roved from the urbanized D.C. suburbs to the state’s rural southwestern edge (where she lives). Her traveling companion? Thomas Jefferson, whose 1785 book of the same title inspired the Athenaeum show.
Although they utilize Mylar and Google Earth, these 3-D collages do have an 18th-century feel. They suggest curiosity cabinets and the childhood of natural science, when men boyishly collected bones, leaves, feathers and the like. Stryk doesn’t feign innocence of contemporary knowledge, though. Her “How the Past Returns” features a bay-shaped black blot and text from a booklet titled “Climate Change and the Chesapeake Bay.”
The pieces are built atop topographical maps and include animal specimens — more often drawn than actual — and portraits of Jefferson, adapted from ones by Raphaelle or Rembrandt Peale. “Maroon (Swamp Diary)” features text about the Great Dismal Swamp from George Washington’s diary and Harriet Beecher Stowe’s “Dred,” a novel in which escaped slaves hide in the bog.
Layered with images and information, these pieces reward close inspection. They’re part Jefferson, part real-world hypertext documents.
