We're part of a culture so infused with objects that we hardly notice most of them on a daily basis. Mark Manders, a Carnegie International 2008 artist from the Netherlands, has to struggle to not notice them.

While talking about his artwork last week, Manders picked up a roll of packing tape lying on a crate in the Carnegie Museum of Art galleries, where his work is being installed, and observed that earlier that day it was on the other side of the room.

That may sound like a simple, even dismissible, statement. But it's an elementary entry to the complexities that Manders explores throughout his work, including the substance (physical and metaphysical) of normally taken-for-granted items, the implications of language and the variety of interpretation an object can inspire.

"If I write a sentence, you think exactly what I want you to think," Manders says. "The viewer reconstructs objects."

Objects fall into "really interesting relationships with the body ... they have shadows." Manders waxes on the properties of objects that we often don't give a nod to, even though we're constantly moving in and out of actual and visual engagements with them.

"I like the way objects travel through the world," Manders says, returning to the tape. "It's really beautiful. People don't think about how objects move. As an artist, you have sort of a task to show people."

But, with a grin, he warns against becoming too perceptually attuned. "Then you become crazy, because it doesn't stop."

Thinking outside the box, while not the exclusive domain of artists, certainly comes with the profession's territory, and Manders appears to spend a lot of time looking -- or imagining -- past the perimeters of containing walls. In 1986, for example, he created a self portrait as a floor plan -- combining self with place, the architecture of building and of body.

One of his works in the International is titled "Room with Clothes, Belt and Contact Lenses," he says, acknowledging nearby elements of the piece that await installation: neatly arranged clothing, including shoes, trousers and a shirt.

That much is empirically evident.

What requires more of an investment from the viewer is thinking about Manders' reason for placing them as an artwork, in a museum, within an exhibition of global significance that will attract an international audience. That questioning -- which initiates a dialogue with the work and ultimately with the artist -- is key to the experience of contemporary art.

Presuming -- or learning -- that the clothing belongs to the artist and was worn while making the piece raises thoughts of an absent being and, conversely, of maintaining presence.

More subtle is the question of association. What do the objects in the title have in common? If anything? What thoughts does bringing them together here inspire? And will visitors from across the cultural spectrum respond similarly or have distinct reactions?

Manders pulls viewers into the everyday on levels both personal and abstract.

Douglas Fogle, International 2008 curator, said recently that Manders "provides a little bit of friction with your everyday perception of the world. That's what an artist does. You get so habituated to seeing the world in a particular way" and Manders is one to disrupt that.

Near the end of our meeting Manders describes another of his works comprising three words/objects -- a table, a corner and a typewriter. Combining them "creates a perfect area to write a book in," he says. Of course. How evident. And how mysterious.

"I really enjoy thinking about objects and finding solutions," he says with a soft joy that glows like a bed of burning coals.

On Monday, U.S. District Judge Richard J. Arcara ruled to dismiss an indictment against Steven Kurtz, a University of Buffalo art professor and co-founder of the Critical Art Ensemble. He was charged in June 2004 with two counts of mail fraud and two counts of wire fraud after emergency responders answering a call about the death of his wife (from natural causes) found bacteria cultures related to an artwork that addressed biotech issues.

Co-defendant Robert Ferrell, a University of Pittsburgh professor of human genetics who was accused of providing the harmless bacteria to Kurtz, has been battling a serious illness and pleaded guilty in February to a misdemeanor charge. Arcara sentenced him to a year of "unsupervised release." Ferrell's wife said, at the time, that the prosecution had been extremely stressful for her husband and, though he'd pleaded guilty, she still supported Kurtz.

Although Arcara ruled the government had not supported the charges, his may not be the final word. The prosecution has the right to appeal and if it does the case would move to the New York Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City.

A docudrama about Kurtz's story, "Strange Culture," featuring Jay Ryan and Oscar winner Tilda Swinton, was released on DVD last month. A percentage of sales will benefit the Critical Art Ensemble Defense Fund.

For more information, visit caedefensefund.org.