Martha Stewart Color Theory

When Daniel Joseph Martinez first installed The House America Built, his replica of Unabomber Ted Kaczynski’s cabin, which was a replica of Henry David Thoreau’s Walden cabin, at The Project in September 2004, it didn’t quite fit, so he cropped it. Also it was split, like Gordon Matta-Clark’s Splitting (1974). Kaczynski’s cabin had become famous as a piece of evidence in his trial in Sacramento in 1996, and had been dramatically photographed by Richard Barnes for The New York Times Magazine in 1998. It’s fate in 2003-04, however, when Martinez conceived of his piece, was unknown. The House America Built was painted in the colors of the season from Martha Stewart Everyday Colors, chosen by Martha Stewart Living Magazine from the paint line licensed to K-Mart by Stewart’s firm, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia: Araucana Green, Hosta Leaf, and Cosmos Lemon. In the spring of 2004 Stewart had been convicted of insider trading and obstruction of justice and sentenced to five months in…