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17/1/2003

Paul Ramirez Jonas

LFL Gallery, New York

"The Earth Seen From Above"

Opening: Saturday 1/18/03, 6 to 8PM

LFL Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of sculptures, photographs and video by Paul Ramírez Jonas titled "The Earth Seen From Above". Below is Paul's description of two works from the show (other works include a solar powered musical automaton in the form of a satallite, a video work tracking the time to sunrises and a series of colored plastic flags commemorating hurricanes):

"Ghost of Progress" -In this video the future appears as an already nostalgic symbol and the present as a place where progress appears as an uncertain direction. The video was shot from a camera mounted on the handle bar of my bike, as I traverse a third world city. On the handle bar is a scale model of the Concorde, giving the crude illusion that the plane is flying through the city. The artifice is always evident - the sound of the pedaling is always present, the discrepancy in scale is unbridgeable. The utopian hopes, and ultimate commercial realities embodied by the Concorde are juxtaposed against a background of low-end street commerce, decaying architecture, pollution, and people going about their daily life and labor. The video is related to a group of Bruegel Proverb Paintings, in which the viewer can scan an entire village from a bird's eye, and observe all the ensuing mini dramas simultaneously.

"Album: 50 State Summits" -I have been hiking, climbing and sometimes simply driving to the highest point in each state. Upon reaching the top I have taken a self-portrait waving a hand made flag that says "OPEN". The photographs acknowledge in equal measure the photograph of Neil Armstrong on the Moon, the photograph of Sir Edmund Hillary on top of Mount Everest and the painting "The Wonderer" by Kaspar David Friedrich. As in most of my works, my action is not a 'first', there is no originality, no 'progress', no acts of possession or discovery. Rather, they are re-enactments in which I follow in other's footsteps. A certain amount of optimism and earnestness is inevitable within each 'expedition', and with it comes a vestige of heroism. The overall project is presented as an oversized album, where each summit has its own page with a blank frame and caption. The blanks exist before the actions. All future photographs already have a resting place. The book charts possibilities, shaping my future, and daring some trips into existence. - Paul Ramírez Jonas

Paul Ramírez Jonas will have a survey show at the Ikon Gallery in Birmingham, England in 2004. He has had one person shows at White Cube, London; Studio Guenzani, Milan; Postmasters Gallery, New York. He has also participated in shows at The New Museum, New York; Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia; Serralbes Foundation, Portugal; The Johannesburg Biennial, South Africa; Kunsthaus Zurich, Switzerland; Galeria Camargo Vilaça, Sao Paulo, Brazil; Künstlerhaus Graz, Austria; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Ireland; Whitechapel, London, England; Seoul Biennial, Korea. This is his first solo exhibition at LFL Gallery, and his first in New York since 1997.

(please visit http://www.automat.com to see Paul's work)

LFL Gallery
530 W24th Street, NY NY 10011
t. 212 989 7700

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