My Art Work with Dehydration and Textures of Inorganic and Organic Objects and with Anthropometric Records of My Body

Adzak describes his work after 1968 dealing with the making of negative forms of inorganic and organic objects. He has produced three different series. In the first, the ‘Dehydration’ Series, he obtained imprints of fruits and vegetables in cement and he left them in the hardened cement molds to display them during and following their dehydration. Similarly, fresh fish suspended by nylon threads were dehydrated, their shrinkage following dehydration being revealed by tabs on the threads. The ‘Textures’ series is comprised primarily of shallow imprints of natural objects and artifacts in plaster to display their structural surface characteristics. The series was extended to include photographs of surfaces, such as those on water which cannot be recorded by the imprint technique. The ‘Anthropometric’ series includes imprints in plaster of parts of his body. His major effort, however, was to obtain ‘interior imprints’—that is, physiological records of organs, bones, etc. inside his body. Illustrations are given from these three series and he describes thoughts he has had that induced him to pursue work in these directions.