Ethan Hayes-Chute

Built-Up Site/Settled Down, 2012 
Wood, found objects

Ethan Hayes-Chute was born in 1982 and resides between Maine, USA, and Berlin, Germany.

Thinking about: Hypothetical domiciles; fantastical isolation; outsider architecture; selfsufficiency; landscape; self-preservation; wood; nails; voyeurism; viewer participation; found materials; daily life; nostalgia; seclusion; sublimity; “natural” habitats; ad-hoc construction; knick-knacks; contrasting scales; craftsmanship; customization; longing; decay

The work of Ethan Hayes-Chute proposes potential living situations stemming from his thoughts on self-sufficiency, self-preservation, and self-exclusion in a variety of media and scales.

Executed in detailed axonometric projection, his drawings have the feel of forgotten architectural sketches or observational drawings made long ago. Depicting various (possibly discontinued) ways of life or models for living, the drawings celebrate the hand-made, the do-it-yourself and the self-sufficient way of life most of us have imagined, whatever our real-life situation may be.

He takes his visions to a life-sized scale, creating fully-immersive cabins built from found and reclaimed materials, outfitted with recycled and improvised furnishings, as well as day-to-day ephemera and artifacts. The public is encouraged to enter and examine these comprehensive and elaborate examples of habitation.

He has built houses in Germany, France, Norway and the USA.

His work refers to the handmade in general, the editing process that naturally occurs with such an ad-hoc creation, as well as the somewhat rudimentary or ramshackle construction, as well as the idea of an object transplanted from its natural habitat to another.

He can often be found exploring dumps and scrap yards or walking the streets perusing second-hand shops for objects with which to populate his constructions.

See also: www.ethanhc.com