Transparency Report

David Spriggs’ Transparency Report is a series of engravings on transparent glass, layered upright to create a three-dimensional form. The engravings depict images of the internal space of various bags through an angle of vision that is reminiscent of airport security x-ray scans used to examine baggage for potentially dangerous contents. On Spriggs’ website, he describes how the series addresses issues of surveillance: “Transparency is undoubtedly a tool for control; it is rarely consensual and is most often imposed.” Using transparency as both a conceptual gesture and creative technique, the four representations that compose Spriggs’ Transparency Report forces gallery visitors to question boarder issues of visibility, access, and control, and how transparency is central to the overwhelming dominance of institutional power in and over our lives.