Inside Out Closet

2023

Inside Out Closet is an evolving performative venue that displays every item of clothing Carper owns along with their past and present dressing projects. This is literally a closet turned inside out, with clothing on the outside and the entire exterior universe compressed into a small chamber on the inside.

Inside Out Closet has been hosted by:

The Yale School of Art Sculpture Theisis Exhibition - March 27 - April 2, 2023

LRCHQEV - May 20 - July 24, 2023

Pratt Manhatten Gallery - January 22 - March 16, 2024

While the Inside Out Closet is on public display Carper performs with the structure, only wearing the clothing they own while inside of the hosting venue. To exit the hosting venue Carper changes out of their clothing and into a uniform pair of silk pajamas. Isolating the act of dressing to the site of the installation.

This closet has several internal and external processing systems including a dressing system, compost holding system for food and their ex’s laundry, a trend forecasting color generator, and a memory processor.

The inner most chamber of the Inside Out Closet features elements of the outdoors. It has an outhouse with Carper’s Trend Forecasting Bucket placed as the shit bucket, a floor made of humus soil, and the walls are finished with exterior house siding.

This chamber also acts as a listening space for Carper’s audio projects.Most recently Carper has been sharing audio clips from their late uncle Jeff Rehg performance archive. Jeff Rehg was a dancer, performance artist, and educator who made work about living with HIV and processing greif in everyday life. Some installations have also included video footage of jeff’s performances projected out of the structure onto an adjacent wall while the audio is localized to the structure's interior.

Inside Out Closet is not about coming out. It's a moving into. A view of the depth that is already present. The inverse of life is not death but a wholeness of both. This structure contains a nesting of systems, a self-portrait of many, folding into infinite potential. As you enter, try to get away from yourself and into another. Hiding in a stores round rack of clothing, a womb, a wall of sound, a space to listen, a story about queer love and loss.