calendario eventi  :: 

X

27/5/2004

Sanford Biggers

CAC Contemporarty Arts Center, Cincinnati

both/and not either/or

Sanford Biggers admits he hasn't left his studio in the past 24 hours but laughs as he promises to eventually make it outside at some point on this unusually chilly Spring day.

"I don't even know what the weather is like outside," Biggers says as he finishes his lunch.

After recently returning from a three month residency in Japan, Biggers is finishing his latest exhibition both/and not either/or, which will debut at the CAC from May 28 and continue through August 15.

Biggers, a New York-based artist, draws from a remarkably diverse range of sources, including Eastern religions, black vernacular expression, 1970s process art, urban street culture, and new technologies. For the CAC, Biggers seamlessly blends ancient and contemporary, local and global images such as hip-hop and Buddhist sacred rituals. He taps into his experiences from traveling around the world, as well as his perceptions of the cultures he has visited. Biggers says he is excited about his new works for the CAC exhibition because of "the experiences behind them."

"In the past, my work has been more of a methodological process, but recently it has been focusing on setting up situations where improvisation and accidents are welcome," Biggers explains. "The process is still there, but has become less predetermined."

What he describes as "more spontaneous" can be seen largely in his new video installations. One video installation is a documentation of a bell choir ceremony at a temple in Japan. The video shows an assortment of bells that range from small household sized bells to large ones found in the temple. The bell choir diversity also extends into the wide age-range of participants - from 200-year-old bells to three-month-old ones.

While living in Japan, Biggers created several of the bells especially for the ceremony from melted down, hip-hop jewelry purchased in Japan. Biggers is interested in the popularity of hip-hop in a culture that has strong roots in ancestral traditions. The bell, often used for ancestral worship, exists in contrast to the exploitative commercialization associated with current hip- hop.

A second video installation looks at the actual creation of the bell. The bell is engraved with a Japanese message that translates into "In fond memory of hip-hop."

Biggers says the melted down hip-hop jewelry and the use of the bell in the bell choir ceremony is "homage to hip-hop past, and the distillation of the 'bling bling' culture into a vessel capable of sound, but only if struck correctly and with reverence".

The actual bell will also be on display in the exhibition. A third video installation is under lock and key, Biggers says, so that there will be element of surprise.

"You have to come and find out yourself," he says.

This exhibition is organized by the CAC.
Exhibition Sponsor: The P & G Fund
Installation Sponsor: The Otto M. Budig Family Foundation

CAC
Contemporarty Arts Center
44 East Sixth Street
Cincinnati, Ohio 45202

stampa

permanent link