Dah Di-dah-dah Dah-dah-dah, Di-dah-di-dit Dah-dah-dah Di-di-di-dah Dit Di-dah-dit Di-di-dit

Dah Di-dah-dah Dah-dah-dah, Di-dah-di-dit Dah-dah-dah Di-di-di-dah Dit Di-dah-dit Di-di-dit, 1985 (approx.) – 2011, h 20 cm x w 13 cm (h 8” x w 5”), 82 page pocket book, black and white text pages printed on 60-pound (90g/m2) cream-colored paper, 4-color front and back cover. Project for Markers 8, International Artists’ Museum Artura/Projective, ArtLife for the World Contemporary Art Space, Venice, Italy.

Translate the long and short signals of Morse code contained in this pocket book into English and you will have detailed walking directions generated by Google Maps from the Venice, Italy gallery in which you are standing to a specific location.

The Google Maps algorithm will bring you on some rather mysterious and seemingly pointless detours along the way, including two segments of the journey by ship; nevertheless, the instructions will eventually get you from point A to point B. Follow this walking route for approximately three days and eleven hours – 2,180 km – and you will arrive at a corner where two lovers used to meet in a black and white film from 1962.

On top of a pedestrian handrail at the intersection you will find a yellow key for a small locker in the Ueno train station in Tokyo, Japan. When you try to use this key to open locker number 6107 it will no longer work because by now the three hundred Yen locker fee has long since ran out, the contents have been taken to the lost and found, and the lock has been changed. So, present the key to the station’s lost and found department and they will hand you a Maxell UR 90 Tinted Oval Window Cassette Shell / POSITION•NORMAL / JAPAN•JAPON cassette.

There are no labels or distinguishing features on the cassette itself. Nor is there any label, or information on the cassette case, save for the fact that the cassette case spine is completely blacked out with marker pen. This is your prize. It is the most valuable thing that I can give to you. You hold my future in your hands.

This cassette tape was fabricated in Japan sometime during the mid-80s, exported to the United States, and purchased in the New York region. The tape was subsequently used to record a conversation between a family member and a psychic. It was, amongst other things, about the possible directions that my life would take. However, after the family member’s death in 2005, and prior to having the opportunity to listen to the tape, the cassette was erased.

In 2009 the erased cassette was brought back to Japan from the United States and presented to a diminutive Japanese psychic who can consistently be found at the corner of Kuyakusho Dōri and Yasukuni Dōri in Shinjuku, Tokyo. After a careful investigation of the tape, the Japanese psychic stated that since the erased recording was originally in English, a language that she didn’t understand, she was not able to decipher it, whereas had the erased recording been in Japanese she would have been able to.

After an improvised ceremony, I quietly placed the cassette in locker 6107, locked it, and walked away with the locker's yellow key. The Maxell UR 90 Tinted Oval Window Cassette Shell / POSITION•NORMAL / JAPAN•JAPON cassette sat in the darkness of the locker until my three hundred Yen ran out and a station attendant took the locker’s solitary object to the lost and found. It now waits for you there, our futures interlocked as the erased tape predicted.

As You Wish

As You Wish (Project for KUNSTrePUBLIK's Angst hat grosse Augen, [Fear has Big Eyes] Angst in Form/Art in Public Space), 2010, four one-color, offset printed posters wheat paste glued in varying configurations throughout Halle, Germany, individual poster dimensions h 84.1 centimeters (33.1 inches) x w 59.4 centimeters (23.4 inches). Installation and installation images by Daniel Seiple, 2010

Poster #1 translation: 10,000 Marks Reward. Who is the murderer? Since Monday, 11th June this year, the following have disappeared: the school-children Klaus Klawitsky and his sister Klara, who live at 470 Müller Street. Various evidence leads us to believe that the children were victims of a similar crime to that committed last autumn against the Doering sisters.

Poster #2 translation: particularly serious case of theft, theft from kindergarten, theft from parking meter, unknown perpetrators broke violently into a gazebo, a tv was stolen and probably drinks, theft of potting soil, theft of camping furniture, chainsaws stolen, screwdriver stolen, wallet stolen, two trees, two peonies and several carnations plants stolen, two trees stolen, two peonies stolen, several carnations stolen, kitchen appliances stolen, unknown perpetrators stole a chopper and solar lamps, photographic technology stolen, car headlight stolen, drinks were stolen, drill stolen, a hair-cutting machine was stolen, garden equipment stolen, chain saws and cordless screwdrivers stolen, diesel drained, unknown perpetrators broke violently into a gazebo and a tool shed and stole a drill, a screwdriver, a saw, a brush cutter, five solar lights, a tent, a fountain pump, and a garden gnome, saw stolen, brush cutter stolen, five solar lights stolen, tent stolen, garden gnome stolen, fountain pump stolen, fish dead, mailbox destroyed, a gazebo on fire.

Poster #3 translation: Puzzle title: ...but the foreigner didn't want to commit crimes, use your welfare system, ask difficult questions, cause anxiety, bring disease, crowd your cities, be insensitive to cultural differences, steal your jobs, dilute ethnic purity, contaminate the homeland, murder Klaus Klawitsky, his sister Klara and the Doering sisters, or steal your plants and potting soil.
Please try to understand and fill in the blanks! Answer: On Tuesday a foreigner came to Germany from New York through Madrid and made posters about angst.

Poster #4 translation: Then I can't remember anything. And afterwards I see those posters and read what I've done. And read and read. Did I do that?

The following essay was written by Daniel Seiple in 2010 for the Angst hat grosse Augen exhibition catalog:

Upon looking at the art of Stephan Apicella Hitchcock, one walks into a contortion of time between real and fictional narratives in which the artist interweaves his own travels with the history and structure of films, art history, people, and places. In the last year alone he has tick tacked around the globe from New York to Cairo, Beirut, Tokyo, Madrid, Berlin, and Italy. At each location a work has been created, an image shot, or souvenir taken. I am a detective retracing his steps, picking up the static images in order to recompose time, and piling into his writings that were left behind as if by a criminal teasing his pursuers.

In June of this year a cryptic advertisement was distributed in Halle, Germany which became the impetus for my writing. A text on the top half is littered with blank spaces like a MadLib, and on the bottom half answers are provided: “Warning! Very soon a person will be coming to Germany/The Czech Republic from a foreign country through Madrid.” Months earlier, Hitchcock had submitted a proposal to KUNSTrePUBLIK to make a series of posters for the Angst exhibition that played upon fears caused by the welfare crisis, local unemployment, and the outsourcing of jobs. The advertisement continued: “Foreign _________ are often blamed for ________ during difficult economic times. (…) On that note does it help to ________ another _________ artist?” The blanks appear to lead to a personal reflection: When this foreigner, presumably Hitchcock himself, visits Halle for the first time, what angst will he find? Will he experience xenophobic suspicions at the shop that prints his posters? Is his proposal already complicated by his identity as a foreign worker, a tourist, or an imported artist? What business does he have trying to voice local concerns for a place he’s never been to, anyway?

Several years ago a series of photos surfaces that document every step from the pitcher’s mound to the dugout of the Encino Little League Baseball Field, in Encino California – where the character Stacy from the movie, Fast Times in Ridgemont High (1982), loses her virginity. In 2009, the photos are presented at a gallery in Berlin as the artwork of Stephan Apicella Hitchcock. Although the photographer never reveals himself in the photos, his presence is eerily felt as the viewer is invited to step into his shoes. Furthermore, the visitors are invited to take one of the photos home, until no more remain. Over the course of the opening the work transforms from unified to fragmented to gone. The evidence of Hitchcock’s walk to the dugout is now dispersed as a series of clues, creating an invisible line forever connecting those who took the photos.

Three years after the first appearance of the Encino photos, I watch a short film by Hitchcock, which focuses on the grave of moviemaker, Yasujiro Ozu, in Kita-Kamakura, Japan. The image jitters and colors undulate, betraying the construction as a contrived, not-so-singular moment. Fleetingly, the images do come together and perhaps the untrained eye might suspect faulty playback equipment or improperly exposed film. But upon traveling to Japan myself, I realize it would be next to impossible for crows, which are generally heard in autumn, to sing with cicadas that only chirp in summer – as it is recorded on the soundtrack. As I deconstruct the work, it becomes evident that Hitchcock shot the grave three times with each take filtered in a different primary color. In what becomes Nonsynchronous Five Times (2007-08), Hitchcock superimposes each sequence in order to create the impression of one singular, color take. As I ponder the potential reasons for this elaborate construction, I recall Ozu’s own methodical nature and use of a fixed camera.

And then, just as I have the feeling of coming closer to Hitchcock’s world, of which I only describe but a few artworks, a profile for the man appears on Facebook which announces the sale of all of the artist’s works that are “still in his possession, as well as the ownership rights to works that were generated, but destroyed.” The various lots reflect a prolific production. They are offered free of charge, first come first serve. At the conclusion of the auction, all descriptions, negotiations, transactions, correspondences as well as the artist’s friends are deleted leaving little evidence to substantiate any exchange (Part Tool, Part Trap, 2009) or artwork at all. Although I would imagine that with a little bit of digging, one could find evidence of the auction on the buyers’ profiles, or deep in Facebook’s servers. Everything leaves a trace.

In summer 2010 in Halle, four posters are spotted around town, conspicuously written in an old German script. The first is a poster of a poster, a screen grab of a film still from Fritz Lang’s dramatic thriller, M, when Hans Bekert (played by Peter Lorre), a murdering pedophile, steps into the frame and casts a shadow over a his own wanted poster. If the poster is by Hitchcock, it is a trademark move of setting his personal and artistic process within a cinematic narrative. Not quite an attempt of Wellsian (non)fictional drama, he dangles a bit of his own cultural research and presents a typographic parallel with the street signs in Halle.

The next poster to catch my eye is a crossword puzzle. I scribble it down in my notebook and take it to the coffee shop to decipher. The answers confirm my hunch and Hitchcock’s message in the advertisement: A foreigner has indeed arrived and made posters about Angst! On the poster next to this, a word search presents the local police blotter concurrent to the week that Hitchcock has visited Halle. In contrast to the serial murders by Bekert, the crimes in Halle portray a more or less blue-collar town with either desperate or juvenile criminals thieving items like potting soil and brush cutters as well as smashing mailboxes. But rather than finding the criminals, the poster sets up the game of finding the crimes, and with a spirit similar to Bekert’s letter announcing his deeds to the newspaper.

On the fourth poster, again in the old script, I read what appears to be a self-referential and cryptic admission. I follow up the first poster later that night by watching M. The movie is haunting, not just because of the convincing story, but because of the ease at which the populace is moved to mob rule after the wanted poster stirs up public angst, paranoia, and vigilantism. Beckert eludes the authorities, but is eventually captured and tried by the local mafia. In front of this kangaroo court, as a wide-eyed and crazed Beckert gives his impassioned plea to the criminals who will have his head, I hear the words written on that final poster: Then I can't remember anything. And afterwards I see those posters and read what I've done. And read and read. Did I do that?

35minutesmen

35minutesmen

大同朋子 Tomoko Daido, 福村順平 Junpey Fukumura, ペイ PAI,

酒航太 Sake Kota, 長広恵美子 Emiko Nagahiro, 真田敬介 Keisuke Sanada,

塩田正幸 Masayuki Shioda

Curated by Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock & Anibal Pella-Woo
Essay by Taro Nettleton
Translations by Akiko Nakamura

35minutesmen book, 71 pages, color with essays in English and Japanese

Fordham University Center Gallery
Lincoln Center Campus
113 West 60th Street at Columbus Avenue
New York, NY 10023

On view: November 6 – December 19, 2010

Opening reception: Friday, November 12, 6 – 8 pm
The Center Gallery is open everyday from 8 am – 8 pm

“35minutesmen” brings together a sampling of work from a Tokyo based collective of photographers in the format of a gallery exhibition and accompanying book with essay. The collective existed for just one year, yet they created a tremendous volume of work that was displayed in a series of monthly exhibitions held in their gallery – a now defunct Fuji film 35 minute processing lab.

While I was living in Tokyo in the fall of 2009, Taro Nettleton, a former student from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, introduced me to a small group of photographers that he knew – the “35minutesmen.” I went to a number of monthly openings at their gallery; however, the exhibition space was so small and the crowd was so large that I rarely got into the space to actually see the photographs. Regardless, I knew that the community that these seven photographers were generating was exciting and would be inspirational for students as a model for maintaining production and fostering connections after undergraduate school.

It seemed appropriate in light of the communal nature of their endeavor that the material would need to be organized by more than one person, so Anibal Pella-Woo and I decided to work on this project as co-curators. Our working method of putting this exhibition together was very organic, low fidelity, and do-it-yourself, not unlike the manner that things get accomplished in a collective – which is to say, slowly and on the smallest of budgets. First, a year’s worth of images were sent from the seven photographers in Tokyo via email and edited in New York down to a working group of 60. Then the continuation of the curatorial process took place in emails sent over the course of three months between New York, Italy, and Japan.

Anibal printed out a set of small test prints in New York on an ink jet printer and I printed out the same set at a drugstore while traveling in the south of Japan. Interesting image pairings were arranged on tabletops in New York, taped to hotel walls while teaching in Rome, shuffled, examined, photographed, and exchanged by email once again. Ideas and opinions were discussed and clarified thanks to Gmail. Even the exhibition postcard image of the “35minutesmen” gallery space was acquired by traveling to Japan via Google Earth and utilizing its “street level view.”

In light of Taro Nettleton’s closeness to the “35minutesmen” scene (he grew up in Japan with one of the collective’s members) we decided that he would be best suited to provide a detailed look into the history and working nature of the group. His insightful essay found in the exhibition catalog also bounced its way between Japan, New York, and Rome numerous times before arriving at its present state.

Faced with the challenge of organizing images made over the course of one year by different people with different concerns, an appropriate selection criteria and organizational schema was a necessity. Initially this entailed looking at the photographs with basic formal concerns in mind and centered on creating visual connections within the group of images. We then branched out into looking at the possibilities of contrasting photographic meanings, context, and pacing. To take a year of work from a disparate group of people and distill it into a singular statement seems to go against the grain of the “35minutesmen” spirit, which was what drew us to them in the first place. In fact, the variety of black and white photographs, color photographs, traditional film based photographs, digital photographs, Polaroid photographs, and sizes all testify to the range of styles within this group of "like-minded" individuals. Consequently, the photographs and sequencing of photographs in this show represent but one of the many ways that they could have been organized.

Duplicating the raucous energy of their openings is an impossibility, as is the inclusion of every image generated by the group; nevertheless, the images on display will serve to give some idea of the variety of photographic strategies and interests that are currently in play in a small collective, in a small area of Tokyo called Araiyakushi. The do-it-yourself nature of the “35minutesmen” project, their communal spirit, and energy will hopefully serve as encouragement for young photographers and emerging artists to create their own peer support structure and exhibition opportunities regardless of their divergent interests – in fact, perhaps all the more so because of them.

Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock and Anibal Pella-Woo, 2010

For additional information please see the 35minutesmen website Alternately, email Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock apicellahit@fordham.edu or Anibal Pella-Woo pella@fordham.edu

本「35minutesmen」展は、東京在住の写真家グループによる作品を、展覧会と併せてエッセイを収録したカタログを通して紹介するものである。１年間限定で集まったこのグループは、短期間で膨大な量の作品を制作、そしてそれを月に一度、廃業した35分仕上げのDPEショップで展示していたのだった。

僕が東京に住んでいた2009年秋、ボストンのミュージアム・スクール出身のネトルトン・タロウが紹介してくれた写真家達、それが「35minutesmen」だった。オープニングの日が来るたびに、僕は何度となく彼らのギャラリーへと足を運んだ。ただし、ものすごく狭い展示スペースに訪れる観客はかなりの人数にのぼったため、実際に中に入って写真を見られることは滅多になかった。それでも僕は、この７人の写真家によって生み出されたコミュニティを面白いと思ったし、また学生達にとっては、卒業後いかに制作を継続して繋がっていけるかということの、ひとつの手本になるんじゃないかという気がしていた。

彼らの試みのコミューン的性質を踏まえると、今回の写真展も複数の人間でオーガナイズするのがふさわしいと思い、アニバル・ペラ＝ウーと僕は共同キュレーターとしてこのプロジェクトを進めることにした。展覧会開催にこぎつけるまでの過程はかなり有機的かつローファイかつDIY、これはつまりチームで何かを成し遂げる時の作法とも言えるもので、最小予算内でゆっくりと進んでいった。まず東京にいる７人の写真家達からeメールでニューヨークに送られてきた１年分の写真を、60枚にまで絞った。それからさらに３ヶ月間、eメールによるニューヨーク、イタリア、日本間でのキュレーションに関するやり取りが続いた。

ニューヨークにいるアニバルが、選んだ写真の縮小版をインクジェット・プリンタでプリントアウトし、日本南部を旅行中だった僕も同じものをコンビニでプリントした。ニューヨークでは、それらが興味深いペアの組み写真として机の上に並べられ、僕が講師として滞在したローマのホテルの部屋でも壁にテープで貼られたりしながら、さらにシャッフルされ、吟味され、並べた写真が再度撮影されてeメールで交換された。アイデアや意見を交わしながら整理していく際には、Gメールが役立った。ちなみにこの写真展のDMに使われている35minutesmenの拠点となったギャラリーの画像も、グーグルアースのストリートビューを利用して手に入れたものだ。

ネトルトン・タロウは「35minutesmen」シーンとごく近しい関係にあり（彼は日本育ちでメンバーのひとりとは幼なじみである）、このグループの歴史と本質を洞察するのには、彼が最も適役であるということで僕達の意見は一致した。写真展のカタログに収録された彼の見識あるエッセイもまた、完成までに何度も日本、ニューヨーク、ローマを飛び交ったのだった。

様々な関心を持つ様々な人間が１年間かけて撮った写真をまとめるという難題を抱えた本展覧会には、何らかの選択基準と体系化が必要だった。そういうわけで僕達はまず、ごく基本的なスタイルの問題を念頭に写真を吟味し、そこに視覚的な関係性を見出すという作業を重点的に行なった。そしてそれをさらに発展させて、写真的な意味、文脈、緩急をふまえた対置の可能性を探っていった。それぞれに全く異なる写真家達が撮った１年分の作品をひとつのステイトメントとして提示することは、そもそも僕達が惹かれた本来のもの、つまり「35minutesmen」精神の本質に反するようにも思えた。実際ここに見られる、白黒、カラー、昔ながらのフィルム写真、デジタル写真、ポラロイド、そして大小織り交ぜた様々なサイズといった多様性が、このグループ内のスタイルの幅広さを物語っている。よって最終的に選んだ写真とその配置も、あり得た多くの可能性のうちの、ひとつの見せ方にすぎない。

彼らのオープニングでの喧しいエネルギーをここで再現することは、彼らが生み出した写真を全て見せることと同様に、不可能だ。それでもなお、今回展示された写真からは、東京にある新井薬師という小さな町に集った小さなグループが実践した数々の写真手法とその多様さの、一旦を窺い知ることが出来るだろう。そして僕達は、「35minutesmen」のDIY精神、共同体的性質、そしてそのエネルギーが刺激となって、若手写真家やアーティスト達が、関心は異なれども——いやむしろ異なるからこそ——仲間同士で支え合う仕組みを作り、自ら発表の機会を作り出すようになることを、心から願っている。

スティーブン・アピチェラ＝ヒッチコック／アニバル・ペラ＝ウー, 2010

35minutesmen 2009 – 2010: On the Passage of a Few People Through A Defunct Photo Lab in One Year, by Taro Nettleton, 2010, translation by Akiko Nakamura

Between April 2009 and March 2010, seven photographers organized a monthly photography exhibition series called “35minutesmen” in a small, long inoperative photo-processing lab in Araiyakushi, a fairly ordinary and slightly inconveniently located neighborhood in Tokyo. Formed around a mall-like street with convenience stores and izakayas [bars offering food] leading from the train station, Araiyakushi is much like many other neighborhoods in Tokyo – a quiet and unlikely home for an alternative exhibition space.

Above the awning of the exhibition space still hangs a sign reading “35mins,” after which the exhibition series took its name. Despite the masculine title, which pays homage in equal parts to the previous life of the space and to San Pedro, California’s finest D.I.Y. band the Minutemen, the series comprised the works of three women and four men who called themselves “Araiyakushi Photographers’ Society,” or “A.P.S.” – an acronym appropriated from the now obsolete alternative film system.

The images that A.P.S. produced were extremely varied. Sake Kota, whose schizophrenic work looks as if it were made by several different conceptual artists, provided the exhibition space. Masayuki Shioda brought the other artists – Junpey Fukumura, Emiko Nagahiro, Tomoko Daido, PAI, and Keisuke Sanada – into the Society. Shioda, who showed two 11x14 images of flora and smaller “scene” shots from the 35minutesmen openings in every show, has also photographed for such magazines as Esquire Japan and Studio Voice (both now defunct), and made a name for himself with his enigmatic “photo brut” images frequently associated with fringe music culture.

For Shioda, who is also the show’s most articulate spokesperson, “35minutesmen” was akin to a Fluxus event. Most known for its work of the 1960s, Fluxus was an international group of artists whose works aimed to blur the boundaries between art and everyday life, privileging ephemeral works such as multiples and “events,” i.e. performances based on instructional texts, over traditional fine art pieces such as painting and sculpture. Likewise, “35minutesmen” was not simply about the prints displayed on the walls. As Shioda understood it, the entire exhibition process, including the interpersonal relations and circumstances it generated, was the work. In this respect, it may be more accurate to say that “35minutesmen” was like “relational art,” a term Nicolas Bourriand coined to describe work from the 1990s, which instead of offering private experiences, provided situations and encouraged viewers to socially interact with one another and, ideally, even form a community. “35minutesmen” certainly privileged human interactions; it even helped forge new social relations. Before every opening, the local police station had to be informed of the event and subsequently bribed to keep the show from being closed down. On one night, a newly opened Okinawan noodle shop next door (which has since closed) extemporaneously fed gallery visitors. From the last Saturday to Monday of each month, 35minutesmen was a bender, forum for discussing photography, culinary experience, a place for New Zealanders to get together, and others to make new friends, or skateboarding plans.

While relational art emphasizes the production of small and temporary, but nonetheless utopian, communities, “35minutesmen” was much less grandiose; it embraced the contradictions and antagonisms that are necessarily a part of any democratic endeavor. As one might guess from looking at the disparity between the photographs included here, both aesthetic and personal connections between the photographers were, in many cases, tenuous. Oddly for an independently organized and alternative exhibition series, the main thread that tied the photographers together was that all of them except Daido and PAI worked at different times at the same rental photography studio. Of the seven photographers, Fukumura, who now shoots stills on adult video sets, has remained closest to this context of commercial studio photography. In contrast, Daido, a New York resident, shoots expressive, high contrast black-and-white images rooted in the tradition of 1970s street photography. PAI, on the other hand, is a prolific zine publisher, who primarily shoots confrontationally-posed portraits of subjects associated with “street culture.”

Not organized by theme, “35minutesmen” was hardly a group show in the normal sense of the word. The fact that a group of people who have little in common would place arbitrary constraints on themselves to put up a monthly show is what made “35minutesmen” intriguing and remarkable. One story regarding the genesis of the project is that Shioda wanted to motivate his acquaintances, who were not actively showing their work. Another story is that the photographers, who are all roughly in their mid-30s, felt it was one of the last chances before middle age – which they feared would mean “settling down” – to participate in such a project (in fact, one of the photographers is having a baby soon). While the show was very open in terms of the people it drew and variety of works displayed, it was also very controlled, even school-like. As if for a critique, each of the seven photographers had to produce, without fail, a group of prints at the end of each month. On some months they had to put up photos they were unsatisfied with. Some of the photographers had recurring nightmares about the end of the month deadline catching them unprepared. As a frequent visitor to the show, even I felt the guilt of an unproductive month having passed when I was invited to a 35minutesmen opening.

Keisuke Sanada, who once had to return early from a trip to New York to attend “35minutesmen,” cooked on most of the opening nights. He confessed to me recently that cooking was, for him, the most important aspect of the show. In his view, there was no reason to pretend that art openings are about anything other than the drinking, eating, and socializing, particularly in Tokyo where few artworks sell even in more commercial galleries. In this light, it makes sense that 35minutesmen would promote social gatherings rather than private aesthetic experiences, if only for pragmatic reasons. For Emiko Nagahiro, who showed a group of quietly emotive and warmly lit images, the most rewarding aspect of “35minutesmen” was cleaning up the gallery space after the openings. Significantly, Nagahiro and Sanada’s views focus on the catalysts and aftermath of fleeting interpersonal relations produced by the event.

For a show held in an out-of-the-way neighborhood, its biggest achievement may have been its assembling of a truly diverse group of people, among whom were artists, English teachers, photographers, graffiti writers, graphic designers, musicians, art critics, painters, a local bar owner, a street cleaner, a chef, a doctoral candidate, a popular magazine columnist, and an acclaimed fashion designer. To claim that photography is a democratic medium may be commonplace in 2010. “35minutesmen’s” use of photography as a catalyst for fostering democratic social relations, however, was a breath of fresh air, particularly in Tokyo’s contemporary art environment, where do-it-yourself projects too often feel regrettably self-involved.

2009年４月から2010年３月にかけて、７人の写真家達が、いささか交通の便が悪い東京の一角に位置する新井薬師という町の、長らく使われていなかったDPE店において、「35minutesmen」と呼ばれる写真展を毎月開いていた。コンビニや居酒屋が軒を連ねる駅前の商店街を中心に住宅地が広がる新井薬師は、東京の他の町とよく似た静かな地域であって、「オルタナティヴ展示スペース」というイメージからは大分かけ離れた空間だった。

この元店舗の看板には今も「35分」の文字が残されていて、写真展の名前の由来となっている。女性の写真家をも含むにも関わらず、この展覧会は、カリフォルニア州サンペドロが生んだ最高のDIYバンド・ミニットメンにオマージュを捧げる為「minutesmen」と題されていた。実際には、このシリーズ展では３人の女性と４人の男性による作品が展示され、彼らは自らを「新井薬師フォトグラファーズ・ソサエティ」もしくは「A.P.S.」と名乗っていた。ちなみに「A.P.S.」は、今や時代遅れとなった代替写真システム「Advanced Photo System」の略語を拝借したものだ。

A.P.S.メンバー達による写真は多様性を極めていた。まず、複数のコンセプチュアル・アーティストが制作したかに思えるほどスキゾフレニックな作風の酒航太が、この展示スペースの提供者である。そして毎回大四つ切りの植物写真２枚と、「35minutesmen」展のオープニングで撮影した小さな“シーン”写真数枚を展示した塩田正幸が、福村順平、長広恵美子、大同朋子、ペイ、真田敬介といった他の参加者達をソサエティに引き入れた。塩田は、『Esquire Japan』や『Studio Voice』（両誌とも今は廃刊）などの雑誌でも活躍し、マイナーなミュージック・カルチャーに縁が深く、「フォト・ブリュ的」とでも言えそうな作品で名を馳せた写真家である。

このシリーズ展の最も雄弁なスポークスマンでもある塩田にとって、「35minutesmen」はフルクサスのイベントに近いものだ。1960年代の活動が最もよく知られているフルクサスは、多国籍のアーティスト集団で、その作品はアートと日常の境界線を曖昧にすることを目的とし、絵画や彫刻といった伝統的なメディアではなく、マルティプルや“イベント”、つまりインストラクションに基づいたパフォーマンスなどの、 短命な作品を重視していた。「35minutesmen」もまた、単に写真を壁に展示しただけのものではなく、塩田が考えていたように、そこで生まれる人間関係や状況も含め、その全過程を作品の一部として提示したものだった。この意味において「35minutesmen」は、「relational aesthetics（関係性の美学）」に近いものと言えるかもしれない。「関係性の美学」とはニコラス・ブリオーが1990年代の芸術を説明する際に使った言葉で、それは、私的な鑑賞体験を提供する代わりに様々な状況を与えて、そこに参加した者同士が互いに影響を与え合い、理想的にはそれがコミュニティにまで発展する、というものである。「35minutesmen」は明らかに人と人との交流を重視していたし、実際新たな社会的関係を築くきっかけともなった。例えば、毎回オープニング前には近くの交番にイベント開催を知らせなければならなかった彼らは、のちに、イベントを中断させられないように賄賂を贈るようになったのだった。ある晩には、隣に新しく出来た（今は閉店してしまった）沖縄そば屋が、その場の勢いでギャラリー訪問者達にふるまってくれたこともあった。毎月の最終土曜日から月曜日にかけて、「35minutesmen」は酒場であり写真談義のフォーラムであり台所であり、なぜかニュージーランド人の社交場にもなっていたのだった。

「関係性の美学」が、小さく一時的でもユートピア的な共同体を作ることを重視しているのに対し、「35minutesmen」はもっと捌けたもので、民主的な試みにはつきものの矛盾や対立も受け入れていた。ここに含まれた作品相互の不均衡を見れば察しがつくかもしれないが、多くの場合において、彼らの間には美的もしくは個人的な関係性といったものが希薄だった。インディペンデントに組織されたオルタナティヴな展覧会としてはそれも妙な話なのだが、これらの写真家達を繋げていた横糸は、大同朋子とペイ以外の全員が、時期は違えど同じ撮影スタジオで働いていたということだけだった。７人の写真家のうち、AVの撮影現場でスチル撮影等をしている福村が、その商業写真の文脈に現在も一番近いところにいると言えるだろうか。それと対照的なのがニューヨーク在住の大同で、彼女は1970年代ストリート・フォトグラフィーの伝統を受け継ぐ、表現主義的かつハイコントラストな白黒写真を撮っている。一方ペイは精力的な“ジン”の発行者であり、主に“ストリート・カルチャー”界隈の人々を被写体としたポートレイトを撮っている。始めにテーマありきで集まったわけではない「35minutesmen」は、厳密にはグループ展と呼べるものではなかった。ほとんど共通点のない人間同士が集まり、任意の制約を自らに課して、月イチで写真展を開くという事実こそが、「35minutesmen」の魅力であり注目すべき点だったのだ。

このプロジェクトの発端に関してひとつ言うと、塩田は、それまで積極的に作品を見せていなかった知り合いにモチベーションを与えたかったのだという。さらにもうひとつ付け加えると、ほぼ全員が30代半ばであるこの写真家達は、中年——つまりこれは彼らにとって“落ち着く”ことを意味するのだが——に差し掛かり、こういったプロジェクトに参加するのもこれが最後のチャンスだと感じていたらしい（実際作家のひとりにはじきに子どもが生まれる）。この写真展は、招かれた人々の雑多さという意味でも展示された作品の幅広さという意味でもきわめて解放的だったけれども、一方ではかなり束縛的で、ある意味学校のようでもあった。クラスでの批評会のように、７人の作家達それぞれが月末ごとに必ず何点かの写真を制作してこなければならなかったのだ。月によっては、自分では納得出来ていない写真を展示しなければならないこともあったはずだ。そして、気づいたら月末の締切りが迫っていたという悪夢に何度もうなされた者もひとりではなかった。ただの鑑賞者である僕でさえ、「35minutesmen」のオープニングの招待が来る頃になると、今月は無駄に過ごしてしまったという罪悪感に襲われることがあった。

一度「35minutesmen」に参加するためニューヨーク滞在を早めに切り上げて帰国したこともあった真田敬介は、ほぼ毎回オープニングで料理を作っていた。最近彼が僕に打ち明けてくれたところによると、彼にとっては料理をすることこそがこの写真展で最も重要だったのだという。彼にとって、展覧会のオープニングはただの社交場以外であり、それ以上であるふりをする必要は全くないのだった。アート作品がほとんど売れない東京では、なおさらである。そういった実質的な理由からしても、「35minutesmen」が個人の美的経験ではなく社交という側面を押し出したのには納得がいく。 柔らかな光の、静謐かつ叙情的な写真を見せていた長広恵美子が「35minutesmen」で最もやりがいを感じたのは、オープニング後の掃除だったという。ここで特筆すべきは、長広と真田が、このイベントにおいて生まれた儚い人間関係の、きっかけと余波を重要視していたという点だろう。

ひっそりとした町で開かれたこの写真展にあって、その最大の達成は、本当に多彩な人々を呼び寄せたことにあると言えるかもしれない。そこにはアーティスト、英語教師、写真家、グラフィティ・アーティスト、グラフィック・デザイナー、ミュージシャン、美術評論家、画家、近所のバー経営者、清掃員、料理人、博士号志願者、人気雑誌のコラムニスト、一流ファッション・デザイナーなどが集まっていた。2010年にもなって、写真は民主的なメディアであると殊更に主張するのは、当たり前すぎるかもしれない。しかし「35minutesmen」が民主的な人間関係を育むための触媒として写真を利用したそのやり方は、新鮮なものだった。特に、残念ながら多くのDIYプロジェクトが自己陶酔に終わりがちな東京の現状においてそれは、新風を吹き込むものだったと言えるだろう。

Landscape Film (Tottori, Japan)

Landscape Film (Tottori, Japan), 2009, video, color, sound, total running time 1 minute and 52 seconds.

Landscape Film is partially constructed from material extracted from Hiroshi Teshigahara’s 1964 film Woman in the Dunes. The scenes utilized from Teshigahara’s film have been sequenced so that they show the protagonist walking through an empty landscape, then suddenly, without reason, breaking into a sprint and running out of the film. The screen in Landscape Film is divided between Teshigahara’s B&W footage and color footage shot in April 2009 in Tottori, Japan where Teshigahara made his film 45 years earlier.

I walked and filmed 199 steps in the Tottori sand dunes corresponding to each of the main character’s paces from the film. Once brought together side by side with Teshigahara’s footage, each of my steps was meticulously slowed down, or sped up to match the shifting gait of the central character.

The soundtrack is comprised of live sounds recorded during my walk and portions of the film’s ominous score. The synchronized footsteps on sand and powerful wind overloading the microphone function as additional sound effects duplicating the protagonist’s movements and environment.

The left channel's figure moving on screen serves as a document of a dubbing process, a point of view shot from Teshigahara’s actor, or potentially even someone pursuing the main character. Beyond the precise matching of the footsteps, the relationship between the footage, like the principal's behavior, is left ambiguous.

Black & White Video

Black & White Video, 2009, found balloon, three cubic yard dumpster, video, black and white, sound, total running time 1 minute and thirty seconds (balloon missing/destroyed). Project for Last Day of Magic, International Artists’ Museum Artura/Projective for Détournement, 2009 Venise, a collateral event of the 53rd Venice Biennale presented at ScalaMata Exhibition Space, Venice, Italy

In the fall of 2008 a black balloon blew down Kent Street in Brooklyn, New York and into my leg. I picked it up, took it to my studio, and bounced it between the studio wall and the front of a video camera. The balloon appears as a black shape on a white field, alternately decreasing in size, or occupying a progressively larger portion of the video camera frame, eventually hitting the front of the lens and blocking all light.

After I filmed the balloon, it sat on a shelf in my studio for five months, gradually shrinking, until I discarded it into the three cubic yard dumpster outside my door. Almost immediately after disposing of the deflated balloon, a friend asked if they could have it, so I climbed into the dumpster and with the assistance of a different friend I methodically emptied its contents into a number of large garbage bags.

Although we sifted through the refuse like meticulous archaeologists, we failed to locate the missing balloon. I checked each piece of trash as I returned it back into the dumpster; nevertheless, the absent balloon did not materialize. The black balloon drifted up to me, stayed for some months, and then vanished. Black & White Video and several images are all the remaining proof of the balloon.

My parents went to Venice and all I got was this lousy...

My parents went to Venice and all I got was this lousy youth sized Brazilian t-shirt of a dead man in a beach chair from a 1971 movie based on a German novella featuring an aristocratic Polish adolescent conceptualized by a third generation Italian from New York who had to sleep with the obsessed South Korean immigrant to get it made on May 5, 2009, 2009, silkscreen and heat transfer on youth t-shirt. Project for Culture Kiosk/Souvenir Art/Markers 7, International Artists’ Museum Artura/Projective for Détournement, 2009 Venise, a collateral event of the 53rd Venice Biennale presented at ScalaMata Exhibition Space, Venice, Italy

If a souvenir is a catalyst for a memory of a past experience, then what better way to remember Venice than by considering a corpse? This collaboration utilizes a classic “joke” t-shirt design from the seventies in which a number of different locations are inserted into the sentence formula “My parents went to (someplace) and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.” Regardless of the place referenced in the shirts, they all emphasize the simple disappointment with the shirt received over the experience enjoyed by the parents. In this instance, the specific information and history printed on the shirt is stretched to an unusual level.

Luchino Viconti’s 1971 film Death in Venice, a story of a famous author’s increasing fixation with a young boy, forms the starting point for a self-reflexive, run-on sentence that incorporates a number of additional details not normally found on souvenir t-shirts. This shirt integrates some of the complexities of its own history, from the origins of its manufacture, to the “labor negotiations” required for its production.

The shirt is printed on the front in English and in multiple languages on the inside of the shirt according to the nationalities referenced in the text. This provides a level of specificity; nevertheless, due to the utilization of online translation programs, numerous mistakes occur. The inaccuracies in translation mirror the loss of clarity often found in the bootlegging process as copies move further away from the original source material towards an international audience.

Moreover, the dead man referenced in the shirt’s text – actor Dirk Bogarde from the final scene of Visconti’s film – is not the image on the shirt, rather an image of a different dead man on a beach chair is utilized from the 1989 comedy film Weekend at Bernie's. The substitution of imagery from an entirely different film genre, made in a different country, from a different era, further emphasizes the inauthentic nature of this souvenir. This project is a collaboration with Jennie Jeun Lee.

Nonsynchronous Five Times

Nonsynchronous Five Times, 2007 – 2008, three RGB filtered black and white Super-8 reels transferred to DVD, color, sound, total running time 6 minutes and 16 seconds

Nonsynchronous Five Times investigates the difficulties of making something straightforward. Three black and white Super-8 film cassettes were shot in single takes from a fixed position looking onto the top of filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu's grave marker In Kita-Kamakura, Japan. Each of the three takes was shot at high speed and with a filter for one of the three additive primary colors (red, green, and blue). Superimposed atop one another and colorized accordingly, the three elements should combine to create a singular color take; however, any deviations between the three pieces of footage caused improper registration and undulating color shifts. The objective of creating one color take was complicated by numerous factors: wind moving the tripod and camera, wind causing ripples on the water atop the grave marker, wind causing movement of the trees and their reflections in the water, as well as changes in light conditions from shifting cloud cover.

The soundtrack is the narrative backbone of the work, providing a real-time documentation of the process of shooting three film cassettes. We hear one cycle of Ozu’s gravestone being washed, the camera running at high speed, the camera being reloaded, and the camera filters being changed. This cycle occurs in the fall (note crows) and in succession three times, once for each of the film cassettes and its associated additive primary filter (RGB). The second sound element was recorded at Ozu's grave marker, yet half a year later in the summer season (note cicadas). Attempts to get clean recordings were often thwarted in both situations by sounds drifting into Engakuji Temple – ambulance sirens, trains, or people walking and talking.

At times, the three pieces of film footage come together briefly in proper registration and work in creating a singular image. As well, at times the sound of cicadas is indistinguishable from the sound of the camera filming. However, most of the time, the five elements that make up this film are in various states, ultimately calling attention to the film's constructed nature. The RGB composite image track is present only for the first three minutes of the film, after which the film proceeds as a soundtrack only - filming three cassettes took six minutes; however, the cassettes are superimposed, not shown consecutively and accordingly take up less than the actual filming time.

12.9 miles, 24 minutes; 25.2 miles, 42 minutes; 18.8 miles, 54 minutes; 11.4 miles, 40 minutes

12.9 miles, 24 minutes; 25.2 miles, 42 minutes; 18.8 miles, 54 minutes; 11.4 miles, 40 minutes, 2009, video, color, silent, total running time 3 minutes and 5 seconds. Book: 2009, bound 162 page hardcover book, h 8" x w 10"

12.9 miles, 24 minutes; 25.2 miles, 42 minutes; 18.8 miles, 54 minutes; 11.4 miles, 40 minutes is a 3 minute and 5 second video comprised of one hundred sixty photographs taken consecutively on Friday, February 20, 2009. The images were shot from a fixed position in the back of a car with a digital camera on full automatic mode. All images were made at one-second intervals by means of a timer and the images are displayed in the order in which they were shot with no editing, or retouching. The information at the beginning of the video denotes the distances and times between three different IKEA locations and the information at the conclusion of the video refers to the exact times at which the three IKEA images were made. The book version of this project was conceptualized, executed, and bound within the same day. This project is a collaboration with Anibal J. Pella-Woo.

Part Tool, Part Trap

Part Tool, Part Trap, 2009, Facebook, assorted artworks

Part Tool, Part Trap was an auction that took place on Facebook over three weeks during which I divested of all art works that I had produced that were still in my possession, as well as the ownership rights to works that were generated, but destroyed. All lots were free, open to the first person that claimed them, and shipped without charge to the new owners in Berlin, London, Cairo, and the United States. There were absolutely no terms to the exchange. All postings of object descriptions, images, negotiations, and correspondence by potential owners were systematically deleted at the conclusion of the project from oldest to newest postings, after which all information and friends were deleted.

The Plot is Very Bare (Berlin)

The Plot is Very Bare (Berlin), 2005/2009, fifty LightJet prints mounted to Sintra and Plexiglas, h 12.3825 centimeters (4.875 inches) x w 16.51 centimeters (6.5 inches)

Bereznitsky Gallery

The Plot is Very Bare represents a walk across a baseball field to the bench in the dugout of the Encino Little League field in Encino, California in the United States. Each photograph is taken from a position one step closer than the previous and the photographs are installed exactly one pace apart from one another.

Visitors to the 2009 Berlin installation of The Plot is Very Bare at Bereznitsky Gallery are invited to pick one of the fifty images, remove it from the wall during the opening, and take it home at the end of the night. As the evening progresses, the work will transition from being cohesive, to fragmentary, to absent. The image you decide on is yours with no attached conditions whatsoever.

Your choice will join you to the individuals who claimed the images to the left and right of your selection. You will become a part of an invisible line of people that are connected despite geographic distance. Additionally, this dugout is where the character Stacy from the 1982 film Fast Times at Ridgemont High loses her virginity to Ron Johnson, the audio consultant from the mall.

Excursions

Excursions, 2008–2009, written text, image with caption, offset printed publication. Image caption: Outdoor movie theater across from Roberto Rossellini and Ingrid Bergman’s house on Via Vittorio Emanuele, Stromboli, 2006

Excursions is a written text that attempts to understand a sudden reversal of my compass’ polarity while traveling in Japan in 2008. Although the piece almost arrives at a conclusion employing the filmic backdrops of Yasujiro’s Tokyo Story, Roberto Rossellinis’s Stromboli, and Henry Levin’s Journey to the Center of the Earth for support, the piece is ultimately unsuccessful in providing a satisfactory answer for the strange geomagnetic occurrence.

“At last I saw the figure of Hans as if enveloped in the huge halo of burning blaze, and no other sense remained to me but that sinister dread which the condemned victim may be supposed to feel when led to the mouth of a cannon, at the supreme moment when the shot is fired and his limbs are dispersed into empty space.” 1

The following thoughts, like limbs dispersed into space then reassembled, form a loose body – rudimentary, transformed, and not entirely unified, but something with the promise of a body nevertheless.

On Thursday, March 13, 2008, I used my small pocket compass to orient my map and myself when I emerged from the Shinjuku rail station in Tokyo, Japan. There are hundreds of exits from Shinjuku station and one can easily wind up walking in the wrong direction, becoming increasingly lost and bewildered if they are not initially pointing the right way towards their destination. As in the past, my compass allowed me to fix my bearings and quickly set me on the correct course. Two days later, while traveling south from Tokyo, I stopped in the city of Osaka to see the grand sumo tournaments. Again, I utilized my compass to adjust the relationship between my map of Osaka and the city itself; however, despite the alignment of the compass rose on the map and the compass held in my palm, I was significantly off course and getting no closer to the Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium. Having become quite desperate after repeating the same, wrong route numerous times, I decided to walk in the opposite direction, concluding that my map of Osaka had somehow been printed in reverse. As I walked on this new course, the Osaka landmarks on the map quickly began to emerge in their appropriate places. I arrived at the Gymnasium and the entire matter disappeared from my thoughts as soon as the sumo bouts began.

Several days after my stay in Osaka, I arrived further south at my intended destination of Onomichi on the Inland Sea. Yet again, I encountered the problem of being significantly off course as in Osaka. I was investigating the city of Onomichi, looking for the different locations where the filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu shot portions of his 1953 film Tokyo Story and I repeatedly found myself getting terribly lost despite the use of my pocket compass. After retracing my steps back to the Onomichi rail station, I carefully compared my map with the station’s map. My map seemed to be exactly the same, so I aligned it properly according to the station map’s compass rose, and set out once again. Now, I navigated with ease to my desired sites and it gradually dawned on me that my maps had not been the source of the problem at all, but that there was something terribly wrong with my compass. Somehow, my compass had suddenly and enigmatically reversed its polarity during the previous days – north was precisely south, and south was precisely north. From my perspective, the world was now entirely upside down.

I sat for a long time in Onomichi at one of Ozu’s filming locations thinking about the implications of the world being unstable enough to abruptly invert. It was both odd, as well as comforting to be considering an enormous change such as a polarity reversal in Ozu’s own backyard, he being a filmmaker whose works are known for their fixed camera positions and methodical, steady nature. What event would be significant enough to cause a compass to rearrange its orientation? Would not such an event have enormous effects on transportation in the world and at the least merit a brief mention in the news? Additionally, what would the repercussions be for my personal life? While thinking loosely around these matters, I recollected that a compass reversing its polarity also featured in a book I had read a long time ago as a boy – towards the end of Jules Verne’s 1864 novel, Journey to the Center of the Earth.

The main characters from Jules Verne’s novel attempt to reach the planet’s core, entering the Earth via an opening in a volcano crater in Iceland. Then, at the end of the story after numerous adventures, they are ejected from the core on a wave of hot lava into a warm climate considerably different from Iceland. The chief protagonist puzzles over the changed environment and eventually concludes (after hearing Italian) that their previous proximity to the magnetized core of the planet affected the functionality of his compass, which had reversed, and that they were on the other side of the world. In fact, it turns out that that they had been expelled from the earth from a volcano on the Aeolian island of Stromboli, in the Tyrrhenian Sea north of Sicily, not back onto the volcano in Iceland. It was not precisely the other side of the world, but close enough in my book.

So far, I have not been to Iceland in my travels, or even remotely close to transiting through the inside of a volcano; however, I actually have spent time on the island of Stromboli where Roberto Rossellini made his film Stromboli in 1949. A few years earlier I stood on the island near the active volcano and considered the possibility of the explorers from the 1959 film version of Journey to the Center of the Earth – actors James Mason, Pat Boone, and Gertrude the Duck – being shot out from the volcano, out of their movie, and directly into Rossellini’s film alongside the heroine Ingrid Bergman. The science fiction of Journey to the Center of the Earth, in some ways a polar opposite of Rossellini’s hard edge realism, would form a bizarre amalgam; further, they even shared a legitimate geographic feature in the volcano. However, sitting in Onomichi, I could not piece together, cinematically at least, what the connections were to Japan and what this had to do with my compass shifting so radically.

Yasujiro Ozu’s Tokyo Story was made in 1953, Roberto Rossellini’s Stromboli was made in 1949, and Henry Levin’s Journey to the Center of the Earth was made in 1959, so there was no commonality of production year to bring the works securely together, or even legitimately into the same mental conversation. Still, I thought, if only I could arrange for a screening of Tokyo Story at the library’s outdoor theater on Stromboli, at the base of the volcano and directly across the street from where Roberto Rossellini and Ingrid Bergman lived while filming, that would be a neat suturing and provide the third side of this filmic triangle.

Upon returning home to New York from Japan, I looked further into the mysteries of magnetism and was quite surprised with the answer from the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Geomagnetism Program when they posed the following question on their website, “Is it true that the magnetic field occasionally reverses polarity?” The website then went on to say with great enthusiasm, “Yes, incredible as it may seem, the magnetic field occasionally flips over! Occasionally, however, the secular variation becomes sufficiently large such that the magnetic poles end up being located rather distantly from the geographic poles; we say that the poles have undergone an ‘excursion’ from their preferred state. During a reversal, between polarities, the geometry of the magnetic field is much more complicated than it is now, and a compass could point in almost any direction depending on one’s location on the Earth.” 2

This new information made me consider my situation quite differently. Who knows what would have happened when my compass flipped over if I had been seeking out film locations for Ozu’s Late Spring, made in 1949, or for his 1959 film Good Morning. Perhaps I would have encountered less complications, smaller variations, and found significant connections with Stromboli, or with Journey to the Center of the Earth. Nevertheless, I had been in Onomichi, Tokyo Story was made in 1953, and consequently the reassembling of dispersed limbs is not as straight as it could be, or, more truthfully, is not at all. Two lines have been joined, with the promise of a potential triangle in a distant, missing leg.

After Verne’s character emerged from the volcano’s halo of burning blaze and spotted the guide, he likened his feelings to the sinister dread of a condemned man just before “his limbs are dispersed into empty space.” If this character were to collect their senses and overcome their anxieties of the unknown, then ask the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Geomagnetism Program “What causes the magnetic field to reverse polarity?” They would be confronted with the following answers:

First, “Nothing.”

Followed by, “The fact that the magnetic field occasionally reverses is simply a property of the continuous, on-going behavior of the Earth's dynamo.”

Then, lastly and most lovely, “There is no ‘cause’ per se.”

Notes:
1 Verne, Jules. Journey to the Centre of the Earth. Trans. William Butcher. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
2 "National Geomagnetism Program Frequently Asked Questions." (April 16, 2007): U.S. Department of the Interior/U.S. Geological Survey. .

日本から来ました。 日本に行ったことがありません。 上記のどちらでもありません。

日本から来ました。
日本に行ったことがありません。
上記のどちらでもありません。
I came from Japan.
I have not been to Japan.
I am neither of the above.

Curated by Stephan Apicella–Hitchcock
November 15 – December 19, 2008
Reception: Tuesday, November 18, 6 – 8 PM
Fordham University’s Center Gallery
Lincoln Center Campus
113 West 60th Street at Columbus Avenue
New York, NY 10023-7414

Including:
有川 滋男 Shigeo Arikawa, 康雅筑 Ya-chu Kang, 西村 明也 Akinali Nishimula, 志甫 和美 Kazumi Shiho, Eric Van Hove, Ben Washington

I came from Japan. I have not been to Japan. I am neither of the above. brings together contemporary artworks from six international artists that display differing relationships with Japan; however, this exhibition makes no singular statement about Japan, or implies that there might even be a cohesive Japan that the artists could speak about. The connections between Japan and this exhibition border on incidental – hence the title, which simply describes the varying levels of association between the artists and the country.

The works in this show are part of a larger exploration into finding a balance between the poles of stating and describing something overtly and leaving something implied, or unsaid. For example, a Scottish computer engineer working for the Toyota company explained to me in a doctor's waiting room in Tokyo that communication between the East and the West is not unlike an iceberg, where what is discernible, what is above water, only represents a small portion of the iceberg's actual structure.

Whether this analogy has any relevance to the dynamic of understanding between different cultures is a lengthy and problematic debate. Still, this concept is an excellent framing mechanism to consider the sculptures, films, and photography by Shigeo Arikawa, Ya-chu Kang, Akinali Nishimula, Kazumi Shiho, Eric Van Hove, and Ben Washington. Each artist demonstrates a superb understanding of their craft in realizing their pieces as discreet objects in front of you, while the conceptual aspects of the works are sufficiently receptive to support a number of interpretations. Maintaining a curious spirit while engaging with the works will allow the emergence of numerous formal connections, overlapping historical concerns, and latent conceptual associations between the pieces.

For additional information please email Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock at: apicellahit@fordham.edu
http://fordhamvisualarts.blogspot.com/
http://www.fordham.edu/visualarts/

北風は明らかに氷山から吹き出す。
A north wind blows, obviously off the icebergs.

Landscape Film (Shatana, Jordan)

Landscape Film (Shatana, Jordan), 2008, video, color, silent, total running time 1 minute and 14 seconds

Landscape Film is comprised of numerous short films made with a digital point and shoot camera as it is repeatedly thrown into the air and caught by the artist. The terrain of Shatana, Jordan is transformed from a static state through a series of pans and frenetic dives.

Untitled (with Kite)

Untitled (with Kite), 2008, video, color, sound, total running time 1 minute and 54 seconds

Collaboration is about having conversations and finding common interests. What better example than flying a kite with a friend and having a couple of beers on a sunny afternoon. However, the piece culminates with the kite’s camera filming a disaster. This project is a collaboration with Ben Washington.

Um Naji, Um Dani

Um Naji, Um Dani, 2008, fabric, thread, buttons

This project was a discreet, almost invisible collaboration with Um Naji and Um Dani (mother Naji and mother Dani), the two women who prepared the meals during my stay at a residency in Shatana, Jordan. I wanted to express my gratitude for their delicious cooking, so I commissioned them to design and sew a new set of clothes that they would wear to the open day of the residency. Despite the fact that we could not communicate linguistically, we spent a pleasant afternoon shopping for fabric, thread, and buttons. After purchasing the materials, I paid them 150% of their stated labor costs to ensure that they would make their garments with extra special care. I was not to be disappointed. When I saw them at the opening in their beautiful new outfits, I was enthralled – they looked like movie stars.

Yalla ya Bascot (Go Biscuits)

Yalla ya Bascot (Go Biscuits), 2008, written text in English and Arabic

In July of 2008, Toleen Touq and I participated in an artist residency in the small town of Shatana in Jordan. While we were being given the initial tour of the town, we heard and briefly saw a car go by in the distance with a speaker attached to its side. The car roamed through the hilly terrain, the speaker repeatedly broadcasting in Arabic the following phrase, "Yalla ya bascot!” (Go biscuits). We decided that this could be the basis for a suitable collaboration, so we started looking for the "biscuit man." Each day we set out and asked anybody that we encountered if they knew anything about the biscuit man. After our daily walks we would sit down and try to recount the people that we met, what they said to us, as well as the visual details of the scene. Gradually, he became a larger than life figure. After much searching, we eventually found him. The text of this piece is a recording of our pursuit, as well as an inadvertent portrait of the town of Shatana. This project is a collaboration with Toleen Touq.

http://www.itch.co.za/

On Tuesday, we started looking for the biscuit man.
We met three children on the road near the church.
One girl had a pink shirt.
One girl had a long neck.
The boy had a deep voice.
We asked them if they had seen the biscuit man.
They said that they had not seen the biscuit man.
They said that there is a shop nearby that sells biscuits.
They said that there was a truck selling watermelon.
They said that they do not know who the biscuit man is.
They said that they do not know when the biscuit man comes.
We walked further into town.

We met a man standing near his pickup truck.
He had a nice face.
He had a nice smile.
He had a gold tooth.
His hair was parted on the side.
We asked him if he had seen the biscuit man.
He said that he had not seen the biscuit man.
He said the biscuit man was from Neimeh.
He said the biscuit man comes every few days.
He said the biscuit man comes at noon, or sunset.
We walked further into town.

We met a man with a keffiyeh.
He had curly gray hair.
We asked him if he had seen the biscuit man.
He said that he had not seen the biscuit man.
We walked further into town.
We met a woman wearing a dark blue dress.
The dress had light blue and white embroidery.
She held Toleen’s hands.
She stroked Toleen’s hands.
She held Toleen’s face in both her hands.
She smiled sweetly to Toleen.
We asked her if she had seen the biscuit man.
She said that she had not seen the biscuit man.
She said that there are biscuits at a shop nearby.
She took us to the shop while holding Toleen’s hand.
She talked about Jesus.
She said that Jesus is in heaven.
She said that Jesus is our savior.
She took us to the shop.
The shopkeeper let us in.
We bought four chocolate bars.
We bought toffee caramel, cream wafer, vanilla wafer, and coconut.
We asked the shopkeeper if she had seen the biscuit man.
She said that she had not seen the biscuit man.
We bought two ice creams from her store.
We walked further into town.

We met a man at the end of a dead end road.
He wore a white djelabiyah.
He rested his left foot on the edge of the balcony.
He held a stick in his hand.
We asked him if he had seen the biscuit man.
He said that he had not seen the biscuit man.
He said that the biscuit man comes every few days.
He asked us to come into his home.
We walked further into town.

We met a woman with a dog.
She was standing in her yard.
She was hanging plastic bags onto her laundry line.
She spoke to us and said, “Come in my loves.”
We asked her if she had seen the biscuit man.
She said that she had not seen the biscuit man.
She said that the biscuit man could be here in one hour.
We walked further into town.

We met a man who was standing in his yard.
He was eating watermelon ice cream.
We asked him if he had seen the biscuit man.
He said that he had not seen the biscuit man.
He said the biscuit man comes every two weeks.
He said the biscuit man comes just once per month.
We walked further into town.

We met two boys who were sitting in a van.
We asked them if they had seen the biscuit man.
They said that they had not seen the biscuit man.
We said, “If you see the biscuit man tell him that we are looking for him.”
We walked further into town.
On the next day, we continued looking for the biscuit man.
We met an older man who was sitting on his porch.
He had long eyebrows.
We asked him if he had seen the biscuit man.
He said to wait while he went and got his son.
We asked his son if he had seen the biscuit man.
He said that he had not seen the biscuit man.
We walked further into town.

We met a boy with a red t-shirt on.
He was standing in his yard.
We asked him if he had seen the biscuit man.
He said that he had not seen the biscuit man.
His mom came out into the yard.
We asked her if she had seen the biscuit man.
She said that she had not seen the biscuit man.
We said, “If you see the biscuit man tell him that we are looking for him.”
We walked further into town.

We met two women sitting on the steps of a house.
There were three children playing nearby.
The woman on the right was wearing black jalabiya.
She was wearing a gold necklace with gold earrings.
The woman on the left was wearing a blue jalabiya.
The little boy wanted to play and fight.
The two women completed each other’s sentences as they talked.
We asked them if they had seen the biscuit man.
They said that they had not seen the biscuit man.
They said that the man with the gold tooth knew the biscuit man.
They said that the biscuit man only comes on Fridays.
We said, “If you see the biscuit man tell him that we are looking for him.”
She offered us some biscuits that she bought from the biscuit man.
She gave us a pink slip of paper from inside the biscuit box.
The slip of paper had the phone number for the biscuit factory.
Then man with the gold tooth drove by and stopped to talk.
The man with the gold tooth said that today he went to Neimeh.
He said that he did not see the biscuit man.
We walked further into town.

On the next day, we continued looking for the biscuit man.
We sat in the center of town with three children.
We waited for the biscuit man.
The man with the gold tooth drove by and stopped in front of us.
He said, “Goddamn this biscuit man – he never shows up!”
The little boy said that the biscuit man looks like a huge tree with branches coming out of his head.
The little boy said that the biscuit man is as tall as the street lamp pole.
The little boy said that the biscuit man’s car is as big as from the church to the red car.
The little boy said that the biscuit man’s biscuits are “this big,” while stretching his arms out wide.
The little girl said that today is Friday and the biscuit man should be coming.
The little girl asked her mom’s aunt about the biscuit man.
The aunt said that the biscuit man only comes once per week.
The little girl ran up to the house with the big picture of the king.
The little girl asked them if they had seen the biscuit man.
They said that they had not seen the biscuit man.
The little girl asked the woman near the red car if she had seen the biscuit man.
She said that she had not seen the biscuit man.
She said that the biscuit man used to come here every day.
She said that the biscuit man had not been coming since we started looking for him.
We walked further into town.
On the next day, we continued looking for the biscuit man.
It was afternoon when we heard the biscuit man.
It was afternoon when we heard his sound.
We heard his speakers in the distance.
The sound was getting louder.
We ran across the parking lot.
We ran further up the road.
We ran to find the biscuit man.
Then we found the biscuit man.
We found the biscuit man.
The biscuit man’s car was colored dark gray.
The biscuit man’s car had four doors.
The biscuit man’s car had a speaker outside the window.
The speaker was playing a song about his biscuits.
The biscuit man’s hair was black.
The biscuit man’s hair was pushed back from his face.
The biscuit man was wearing sandals.
The biscuit man was wearing pants.
The biscuit man was wearing a shirt.
The biscuit man’s shirt was the color of his car.
The biscuit man’s car was filled with boxes of biscuits.
There were boxes of biscuits and Turkish delight.
The biscuit man’s friend was with him in the car.
The biscuit man’s friend had on a purple shirt.
He sang the song about the biscuits that was playing from the car.
The biscuit man’s friend sang a song for the both of us.
We had found the biscuit man.
We had found him and his friend.
We had found the biscuit man.
We walked back to our home.

On the next day, we heard from the biscuit man.
Now the biscuit man was looking for us.

Ragged Right

Ragged Right, 2008, archival ink on acid free 74 pound polypropylene, h 12" x w 9"

Plot keywords from the Internet Movie Database for a 1979 film were carefully transcribed by hand; however, the writing became increasingly compacted and illegible as the transcription process proceeded, mirroring the increasing strangeness of the movie’s storyline.

Untitled (with Kite)

Untitled (with Kite), 2008, video, color, sound, total running time 1 minute and 54 seconds

After two weeks of unsuccessful attempts to fly home built kites made from garbage bags and sticks, we finally gave up and purchased an imported Chinese kite from a nearby store in Irbid, Jordan. The first flight was a tremendous success; however, the small video camera attached to the kite was mistakenly turned off just at launch and turned back on upon landing. There after followed four kites, all of which would fall apart in a relatively short span of time. This process of continued foundering was interspersed with days marked by a total absence of wind, which is highly unusual for the town of Shatana in the North of Jordan. The second successful flight was to be the last, as the kite string broke and the kite flew off on its own according to the wind. The video camera recorded the snapping of the kite string, the collaborators in pursuit of the renegade kite, and the kites’ journey across the landscape to its final resting spot. This project is a collaboration with Ben Washington.

A Very Slow Rhythm

A Very Slow Rhythm, December 8, 2007, 12:02 PM – January 12, 2008, 12:13 PM, printed balloons (watte kudasai - pop, sutte kudasai - inhale, atarashii fuusen ni iki wo haite kudasai - exhale into a new balloon), pin, locker, Tokyo Shimbashi Station Karasumori exit 4, underground level B1F

Off the Record, curated by Eric Van Hove, hijacks the X-CUBE© locker system which allows multiple users to exchange packages by using a touch screen and their cell phone numbers as digital keys. The curator places the artwork, invites the first person to the exhibition by registering their cell phone number, then the invited viewer uses their cell phone to unlock the locker and view the work. The next person is invited by registering a new cell phone and in this manner the exhibition travels out into the world.

For A Very Slow Rhythm a balloon was blown up with a single breath of air in New York City, mailed to Tokyo, and placed in a locker in Shimbashi Station along with 25 empty balloons and a pin. Once the international journey was complete, the focus of the project became the transference of the single breath of air from visitor to visitor. After popping the balloon, participants breathed in the previous donor’s breath, then filled a new balloon with their own exhalation. Used balloons slowly accumulated in the locker forming a record of the communal breathing – a simultaneously anonymous, yet intimate exchange. At the conclusion of this project, the last balloon was returned to New York and the original breath of air was reclaimed after being shared by numerous individuals.

Looking Southwest towards Midal al-Ataba from the Northeast corner of Shari Khulud and Shari al-Azhar...

Looking Southwest towards Midal al-Ataba from the Northeast corner of Shari Khulud and Shari al-Azhar, Seventy consecutive 30-second takes with a Cannon S70 point and shoot camera, 2007, video, color, sound, total running time 34 minutes and 55 seconds

Part performance, part traditional street photography, and part objective surveillance film – a domestic point and shoot digital camera was utilized to shoot seventy consecutive short films from a stationary position on a Cairo street corner. The camera was held at chest level pointed in the same southwest direction for each of the 70 takes with no regard to compositional framing, or subject. The camera focus and exposure were set before each take according to the distance and light on the artist’s feet. The camera’s maximum shooting time of 30 seconds and the size of the memory card dictated the length of individual takes, as well as the length of the film.

Anna – Léa Massari – Anna Maria Massetani

Anna – Léa Massari – Anna Maria Massetani, 2007, audio, total running time 4 minutes and 35 seconds, accessed through "On Call Audio" playback on demand at Bloomberg Headquarters, 731 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY. Presented as part of Art in General and Bloomberg L.P.'s Horizon, curated by Jan Van Woensel

Find Léa Massari, the actor who played the disappearing character Anna in Michelangelo Antonioni' s 1960 film L'Avventura, and almost have a conversation.

Extensions on the Dial HORIZON card:

• Ext 01: Dialogue 1 by Eric Van Hove
• Ext 02: Dialogue 2 by Eric Van Hove
• Ext 03: Dialogue 3 by Eric Van Hove
• Ext 04: Music by Sufjan Stevens: Flint (3:45)
• Ext 05: Music by Sufjan Stevens: Tahquamenon Falls (2:20)
• Ext 06: Music by Sufjan Stevens: Holland (3:28)
• Ext 07: Music by Sufjan Stevens: Romulus (4:43)
• Ext 08: Music by Sufjan Stevens: Vito's Ordination Song (7:06)
• Ext 09: Going Towards the Wrong Island and Going Towards the Right Island, 2003–2005 by Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock (2:29)
  
• Ext 10: Ritorno a Lisca Bianca, 2003–2005 by Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock (3:29)
• Ext 11: A Triangulation (Italy), 2003 – 2006 Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock (3:06)
• Ext 12: An Island, 2006 Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock (1:57)
• Ext 13: Anna – Léa Massari – Anna Maria Massetani, 2007 Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock (4:35)

Untitled-17: “Epson Perfection 2580 Photo” B by A, “Epson Perfection 2580 Photo” A by B, September 28, 2007, 3:48 PM

Untitled-17: “Epson Perfection 2580 Photo” B by A, “Epson Perfection 2580 Photo” A by B, September 28, 2007, 3:48 PM, 2007, C-print mounted to Plexiglas, h 11 1/2” x w 17”

Two “Epson Perfection 2580 Photo” flatbed scanners were placed with their glass scanning surfaces facing each other, oriented so that the recording mechanisms passed in opposite directions as they made their scans. The resultant left and right images that form this diptych are the raw scans generated according to the devices’ factory presets and are printed at one hundred percent original size with no retouching, adjustments of image density, color correction, or cropping. Although the settings were identical for both units and the scans initiated simultaneously, the two images have numerous distinct, if subtle, variations from one another.

A Triangulation (Japan)

A Triangulation (Japan), 2006, MDF, paint, c-print mounted to aluminum, video, written text, Queens Museum of Art, southeast ramp, Flushing, NY. Sculpture: h 91.5” x w 46.125” x d 46.125,” destroyed, image: h 6.57” x w 9.1,” video: color, sound, total running time 30 seconds, looped. Writing: tri-fold printed handout.

Special thanks to Eric Zeszotarski of Solid Studio.

(Foreword and first entry from ten field reports)

Subject: Foreword
Date: June 19, 2005 9:32:03 PM Japan Standard Time

I was initially pleased upon seeing Cinderella Castle in Tokyo Disneyland at the Tokyo Disney Resort in Japan. Its duplication of Cinderella Castle in The Magic Kingdom at the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida was precise to the smallest detail and seeing it was like reuniting with a long-standing friend. Still, in short order the comforting familiarity was replaced by mounting anxiety and a vague sense of dread. Yes, there was an abundance of grey stone, gold trim and royal blue in the rooftop shingles. Yes, the trickery of forced architecture operated in the same manner as its companion in the United States, yet something far more powerful and inexplicable was at work than simple perspective deception. Seeing this building replicated accurately in another country had the consequence of destabilizing my sense of orientation. Somehow this doppelgänger, because of its stubborn, insistent sameness, operated effectively in inverting everything that surrounded it. This baffles me.

I understand how Cinderella Castle’s combination of architectural styles taken from various castles and chateaus in Europe is not terribly odd in and of itself, since the Disney “Imagineers” wanted their castle to be as genuine as possible; all the same, seeing this building exported from France, to Florida, then on to Japan creates a double displacement of an uncanny nature and merits closer investigation. I intend on exploring this predicament of authenticity further during a fact-finding mission to Florida that will be unified with my explorations from Japan. Understanding how the Castle compromised my sense of grounding is of primary importance, particularly as I am a simultaneous critic and fan of “The Happiest Place on Earth.”

442 days later…

Subject: The Happiest Place on Earth 1
Date: September 4, 2006 11:30:21 AM Eastern Daylight Time

So, I am 100 feet inside the park sitting on the steps of City Hall looking around. The train at the Walt Disney World Railway just gave several quick toots and an "all aboard," another group is off on a circumnavigation of the park. The familiar smells of popcorn and vanilla float on the breeze and the Main Street Transportation Company just pulled up, its clip clopping barely audible above the sound of the band bouncing through a homecoming march; even so, I must say that I am a bit on edge because in addition to presenting my ticket at the gate only moments ago, I was also asked to present my index finger for a fingerprint scan. This is the beginning.

Seeking to understand the disorienting effect of the Cinderella Castle at the Tokyo Disney Resort in Japan, Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock subjects its image (and those of its twin at the Magic Kingdom in Orlando, FL) to some forms of displacement reciprocity. In a spare installation, a looping video captures the Tokyo Disney Castle on a cloudy day spinning around the edge of the screen. Near the video, a simplified silhouette of the castle, bisected by its copy, hangs upside down from the ceiling like a stalactite. A third element, a photograph from Orlando’s Disney Resort, further complicates the entertainment franchise’s aggressive innocence and its disorienting duplications. – Herb Tam, Associate Curator, Queens Museum of Art.