As the World Turns (Brutally)

As the World Turns (Brutally), 2001, audio, total running time 2 minutes and 41 seconds, installed as part of Art in General’s Audio in the Elevator program

As the World Turns (Brutally) is an audio piece constructed for Art in General’s elevator in which all sounds point to the fact that humanity, despite being able to harness various elements of technology, will ultimately fall prey to its own viciousness. The soundtrack calls into question the human need for excessive brutality by isolating certain horrific moments in the Steven Spielberg film Saving Private Ryan. Screaming, crying, grunting, struggling, punching, explosions, and every gunshot in the movie are layered upon each other to a point of emotional excess and preposterousness. This frenzied and vicious collection is complimented with an amalgam of whimsical, although emotionally saccharine John Williams’ scores from earlier Spielberg films Close Encounters and E.T., thereby propelling the absurdity component even further.

Falling Between Positions

Falling Between Positions, 2002, stereoscopic 3-d video projection, color, silent, total running time 7 seconds, looped

In Falling Between Positions, the seemingly simple action of walking is broken down into a series of small, planned increments for examination. Three paces were executed over the period of one hour. Each pace was broken down into 25 stages of body movement, where each of the 25 phases making up a single pace had to be held for 60 seconds. In the final stereoscopic 3D projection, the three paces are sped up approximately 4000% so that they appear at normal speed. This project is a collaboration with Brian McClave.

Microviews

Microviews, 2002, 600 photographic images each in tabbed hanging files, 5 modified file cabinets, 6 chairs, monitor, video, color, silent, total running time 30 minutes, looped, l 24’ x w 1’6” x h 3’. Installed at: The Municipal Art Society, Urban Center Galleries, New York NY and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, One Wall Street Court, Second Floor, New York, NY

Microviews collects photographs and other documentation of the World Trade Center made by over 70 artists participating from 1997 – 2001 in a studio residency program located in Tower number one. The materials are individually filed, systematically categorized by formal characteristics, and cross-referenced. The file drawers rest on a base of five vertical file cabinets that lie on their sides. Additionally, a wall-mounted video silently flips through the images in the cabinets, which remain on screen for approximately 3 seconds each. Microviews provides no single way to navigate the archive. Rather, its system of cross references allows for an infinite number of approaches to each image, which in turn acquire different shades of significance depending on the particular sequence of images leading up to and following it. This project is a curatorial collaboration with Erin Donnelly, Christopher Ho, and Moukhtar Kocache.

Part Trap

Part Trap, 2002, cedar, stainless steel screws, h 20’ x w 15' x d 20’, destroyed (recycled). Installed at: Socrates Sculpture Park, Long Island City, NY.

The design of Part Trap, an open-air pavilion, is based on a 2” x 2” roach trap. The structure serves as a resting spot for visitors to Socrates Sculpture Park, as well as a framing device for viewing nearby Roosevelt Island and the island of Manhattan from Queens. Part Trap is positioned so as to utilize the view of the two islands as a borrowed landscape, creating a linkage between the near and distant and extending the border of Socrates Sculpture Park westward beyond its actual margins. Aromatic cedar slats replace the roach trap’s industrial black plastic creating an airy, multi-purpose environment marked by shifting qualities of light and shadow throughout the day. Additionally, Part Trap has a low table integrated into its design, encouraging sitting, relaxing, and the formation of a temporary community by visitors.

Special thanks to Eric Zeszotarski of Solid Studio.

Towards a Low End Theory

Towards a Low End Theory: New York City 2002 – Emerging Photographic Practice

Curated by Stephan Apicella-Hitchcock and Matthew Bakkom
January 25 – March 2, 2002
The Minnesota Center for Photography
711 West Lake Street, Minneapolis, MN 55408

Including:
Irvin Coffee, Ejlat Feuer, Lilah Freedland, Mattias Geiger, Adam Henry, Sigrid Jakob, Tom Kehn, Daniel Lefcourt, Kristin Lucas, Felicia McCoy, Evie Mckenna, Saul Metnick, Adia Millet, Laurel Nakadate, Panoptic, Craig Smith, Wherebouts

It is the belief of many that the cataclysmic events of the recent past have altered our cultural, physical, and emotional landscape. Whether it is a shift in human consciousness sparked by the psychological, a change in human conditions created by the economic, or a reconsideration of architectural assumptions as a result of new physical threats, the current situation is extremely fluid and rich with the possibility of change.

Frequently in the past, extraordinary events have served as the catalyst for the emergence of new cultural paradigms, styles of tool use, and shifting of societal attitudes; nevertheless, it is important to consider that these archetypal moments and attitudes, as well as our ability to perceive them, come into view only gradually. In an attempt to identify these currents, their complex expression and simultaneous, or even competitive existence, we propose Towards a Low End Theory, a selection of new work by emerging artists from New York City representing a snapshot from within.

The concept of “Low End Theory” is marked most significantly by localized, individually oriented points of emergence. This “theory” may be also be considered as the descriptive term for a time period during the initial stages of a building arc, a qualifier for describing a method of do-it-yourself fabrication, as well as the ripple effect of an event or work of art beyond its immediate or surface meaning. The resultant shock waves from 9/11 traveled from the mass societal level to reach each constituent point of this metaphorical spectrum, quickly becoming concrete in the form of discrete thought and the productions presented.

Architecture, both in the strictest sense of the definition, as well as including architecture as the design, structure, and behavior of systems, is the predominant theme in this exhibition. The photographs and films included in Towards a Low End Theory often relate to this subject tentatively and tangentially, as the aforementioned varied points of emergence have the tendency to avoid cohesion and quietly navigate their way into existence rather than boldly proclaim themselves with certainty and a false sense of bravado.

The artists in Towards a Low End Theory present a variety of calculated and intuitive responses to buildings and spaces – from Kristin Lucas’ video Five Minute Break considering the subterranean basements of the World Trade Center by means of an animated tour guide, to Felicia McCoy’s concentration on framing subway conductors within the claustrophobic immediacy of their underground workplace, to Saul Metnick’s taxonomic approach to documenting the fixed spaces of (previously mobile) burned out cars found in his surrounding Brooklyn neighborhood. 2002 is the period represented in Towards a Low End Theory in which we begin to see the initial effects that alterations of our landscape have had on the artistic concerns and work of seventeen artists.

Allez Cusine (Go Kitchen)

Allez Cusine (Go Kitchen), 2002, video, color, sound, total running time 2 minutes and 31 seconds, (image: 16 video stills)

Allez Cusine is a hallucinatory montage of fifty commercials in which artfully arranged portions of dog food are endlessly presented on spotless porcelain dishes and elegant crystal plates with decorative trim. For 2 minutes and 31 seconds various combinations of commercial strategies attempt to seduce the viewer with their pitch of visual plentitude.

Manicured hands courteously present and slide fine china across the screen, plates slowly revolve cutlets, silver forks rotate juicy morsels, wooden cooking utensils tumble nuggets and mix in slow motion, and spoons dance modest servings up towards your mouth. Gleaming knives abound – slow pans across luminous knives cutting and displaying, as if pâté, close-up shots of glowing chef’s knives precisely cutting, as if fine fillet mignon. Medallions are delicately divided, then glistening portions are gently slid apart to reveal their perfectly cooked and tender insides. The gliding camera dollies closer towards and across the immaculately plated food – harmonious in color scheme, formally arranged, and attractively garnished with hints of color. One dish is even served with a rice pilaf.

The emotionally soaring soundtrack for Allez Cusine is Fighting 17th, part of Hans Zimmer’s score for the 1991 Ron Howard film Backdraft, and later used as the introductory theme music for the Japanese television cooking show Iron Chef. The music, described as “driving,” “heroic,” “brassy,” and “triumphant,” serves as a proper counterpart to the visual imagery, both sophisticated and complimentary; yet always informed by the knowledge that the culinary delicacies presented are for the eventual consumption by animals, not humans. This project is a collaboration with Tom Kehn.