Artist Statement & Reviews
"David Nelson's Journeymen: Apotropaic was perhaps both the most tough-minded and fragile work in the show. It requires a close, unhurried viewing that was possible because the installation allowed viewers to move at a casual pace from one work to the next without attention being siphoned off by the demands of nearby pieces. Hence, Nelson's sculpture came across alternately like a whisper or a monotone or, more often, as ironic twists and non sequiturs. The objects comprising the sculpture suggest low-tech tools from earlier times, things that might function only if you had lived when they were made. These objects make sense, yet they don't; they engage viewers with a tacit expectation that the viewer will, in time, manage to engage with them. Still, they remain distant, cutting across a continuum of time in which many people were here, doing things, just like us, but also not doing things, just like us. It was hard to look away from this compelling work."
- Edward McCullough, New Art Examiner