Katie Turnbull, Modern Vanitas (detail) 2012 image courtesy and © the artist, commissioned by Experimenta |
Experimenta has commissioned five new works from local and international artists. In an ongoing investigation into robotics and the uncanny, Wade Marynowsky (Aus) has created The Acconci Robot. Inspired by Vito Acconci’s 1969 performance Follow Piece, in which the artist randomly chose and followed a passerby until they went into a private space, Marynowsky’s robot takes the form of a wardrobe that follows gallery visitors around when they are not looking, stopping as soon as it is spotted. (See Dan MacKinlay’s review of Marynowsky’s previous work, The Hosts.)
Modern Vanitas by Katie Turnbull (Aus) uses a juxtaposition of old and new technologies. Starting with still life, her work draws on the symbologies of life, death and time common to baroque vanitas art but combines these with images of globalisation, digital technology and communications. The work takes the form of a proto-cinematic mechanism, a variation on the zoetrope.
Jess MacNeil (Aus/UK) is creating a three-screen immersive work filmed in Paris outside the Hotel de Ville, in which ice skaters play a game of sparrowhawk (a variation of tag). However MacNeil has removed the skaters from the image leaving only their shadows. The skaters only become visible when they make physical contact. Also screen-based is Milieu by Christopher Fulham (Aus), a 58-minute single-channel work filmed in one take in an urban location. Through post-production manipulations the work seeks to challenge viewers' level of attention and awareness, drawing them "into the inner lives of those depicted on screen" (press release).
For the big screen at Federation Square, Young?Hae Chang Heavy Industries will be presenting a new work made specifically for Speak to Me, in their trademark style of noir text animation and cool jazz (see review of ALL FALL DOWN at MAAP04). At ACMI Ian Burns (Aus/US, in his commissioned work anywhere and here, will create assemblages of screens and domestic and hardware items to explore consumerism and the physical construction of cinema images.
Sylvie Blocher, 10 Minutes of Freedom 2 (still) 2010 image courtesy and © the artist |
Scenocosme, Lights Contacts (installation view) 2010 image courtesy and © the artists |
Experimenta: Speak to Me, various venues across Melbourne, Sept 14-Nov 17, 2012; http://www.experimenta.org
RealTime issue #110 Aug-Sept 2012 pg. web
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