By Laura Silver
Viva the typewriter and other outmoded means of communication that inform the eight technologically savvy, multi-media works that make up “The Last Generation,” a new exhibition on display at Apexart. Curated by poet and art critic Max Henry, the show is intent on articulating the relationship between obsolete processes and cutting-edge creation.
Analog and digital aren’t necessarily as distinct as one may imagine. The former represents an array of possibilities (think of a clock with hands that can capture nanoseconds); the latter is based on systems stemming from endless combinations of ones and zeros. It’s a “fascinating moment,” says Henry, who collected international examples of old-fashioned objects that inform modern-day inventions.
The centerpiece of his exhibition is Jan Mancuska’s “9 I was falling …” (2005), a floor-to-ceiling countdown in inverted words and figures. The narrative trickles up in truncated phrases: “I will fall backwards into space. I will try to turn my head to see below and count in the air how many seconds I’ll have left before impact.”
The Jack and the beanstalk-esque string of metal text lands next to a DVD projection of an image of the same work. In true analog (read: unpredictable) fashion, other lighting in the gallery creates shadows of the piece that are cast on walls and floors of the room and the arms and legs of passersby.
It’s not a mistake.
Henry positioned the tower of words to anchor the show and to force viewers to navigate as mice —the computer devices, not the rodents — through the gallery. He calls Mancuska’s installation “a sculptural, three-dimensional object floating in the space.”
The natural trajectory leads to Malachi Farrell’s “These boots are made for walkin’” (2005) a collection of six, army-style camouflage hats that swivel and quiver in unison atop a corresponding number of regulation black boots. Out of each piece of footwear, a white cord extends into a pool of electronics stationed on a nearby orange lunch tray. That’s what makes the hats bow in unison, then shutter upward in a series of shock-induced jolts that evoke a rude awakening rather than an act of reverence.
Henry likens the digital/analog divide to the military’s methodology: “In war, equipment is not enough. That’s why there’s man-to-man contact.” The hat-boot combinations pause between maneuvers, so the squashed torsos resemble “analog soldiers” and the hi-tech prosthetics they’re coming home with.
War is also depicted on the home front. Kota Ezawa’s “Who’s afraid of Black, White, and Grey?” (2003), a digitized two-channel video, depicts Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in monochromatic, collage-like sequences of the 1966 film “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” George (Burton) pulls the trigger on Martha (Taylor) and screams, “Pow! You’re dead.” The shotgun yields a striped umbrella — laughter and relief.
There’s something similar about a generation of young artists who rely on simplistic technologies to develop up-to-the-minute media. The results are explosive, unexpected, and oddly soothing. They breed intrigue, not fear.
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