For Immediate Release
Contact: Aline Hilford at (203) 544-9692, x15 or aline@alexanderisley.com

The Voting Booth Project

Alexander Isley along with Forty-six other designers, architects, and artists contributed to an exhibition at Parsons School of Design in NYC. The exhibition showcased the artists’ response to the Votomatic punch-card voting machine—the very object that sent the 2000 presidential election in Florida into a tailspin.

Each participant was sent a metal valise containing the collapsible booth, a design that has changed little since it was introduced by Votomatic in the early 1960’s, and that for a time, was the most widely used voting machine in America. Many of the booths used in the exhibition still had the chads in them.

The booth project became a platform with which to speak out about democracy in the public realm and to investigate design’s relationship to our country’s democratic ideals.

Alexander Isley used mixed media and felt to create “Palm Beach Playhouse,” turning the Votomatic booth into a presidential puppet show. “The 2000 election was a true theatrical experience. This piece attempts to recreate the dramatic tension, nuance, and statesmanship reflected in the American electoral process and the performances of that year” said Isley.

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