Victory or Defeat?

Trophy Series by Rob McKirdie
Artist and Fine Art Instructor at Spokane Falls Community College

I was quite taken with McKirdie's found object series in the exhibit currently at LITTLE DOG, addressing the significance/insignificance of trophies and how over the years they encourage and applaud excellence, or totally lose context when presented to everyone regardless of merit, just so none feel left out.

It seems to me that a healthy sense of competition is a component of survival, of striving to improve performance or production. A trophy loses significance if it is presented arbitrarily, just because.

The titles aptly convey series significance: Victory or Defeat, Triumph, Catastrophic Failure, Victorgaurus Rex.

These are comparatively small works by McKirdie. You can see other examples of his found object assemblages at his website: www.robmckirdie.com