Two exhibitions
dal 27/10/2004 al 18/12/2004
Segnalato da
27/10/2004
Two exhibitions
Feigen Contemporary, New York
Lars Arrhenius's exhibition include several large works where small cibachrome prints mounted on panels are placed in puzzle or map-like configurations, as well as a new digital animation. Dawn Clements explores a world of interiors, arduously rendering either her own immediate environment in a series of detailed and expressive drawings or capturing the staged sets of films and soap operas by continually replaying and carefully observing them.
Lars Arrhenius
Lars Arrhenius is an artist based in Stockholm whose serial, graphic installations and animations merge a diagrammatic narrative with a social narrative. This exhibition, his first in the United States, will include several large works where small cibachrome prints mounted on panels are placed in puzzle or map-like configurations, as well as a new digital animation.
Arrhenius often uses pictographs, the kind of stereotypical figures and universal symbols seen on public information signs. A direct use of media, and a judicious blend of austerity and irony are typical of his work. The digital characters in his animation, “The Streetâ€, create an exaggerated view of daily routines, where each individual contributes to keep things going like an anonymous cog in the machine of life. Arrhenius’ hermetic but familiar world is propelled by a momentum of the mundane that insistently plods onward. In another work entitled “Habitatâ€, in which a five-floor house is represented by the stacked rows of 43 C-prints, we view a sequence in the lives of 10 people breaking down the archetypes and representing the possibility of personal choice and eccentricity.
By using impersonal, urban symbols to mirror our usually unexamined habits, Arrenhius draws attention to the fact that the world goes on, whether we participate in it or not. Following the logic of games or hypertext, some pieces offer multiple paths and outcomes depending on what chain of events one follows, as is illustrated in the branch-like circuitry of his “The Man Without One Wayâ€.
Reminiscent of the work by his late fellow countryman and proto-Pop master, Öyvind Fahlström, the world map of Arrhenius’ “WWW†is overlaid by a cast of players who are interconnected through a cacophony of cause and effect type dramas. Arrhenius’ humorous use of onomatopoeia creates a chain of events that link the sounds we read to a series of actions and consequences. In another work titled “A-Zâ€, Arrhenius superimposed a progression of encircled and intertwined stories over an enlargement of the classic London street guide.
Whether looking at a street, an apartment building, a city, or pulling further back, Arrhenius focuses on the endless activities of urban life and offers a sociological view of the complexity and repetition of human behavior. Like a modern-day Bruegel, Arrhenius examines the tragi-comic in the world around him.
Lars Arrhenius is represented in the collections of the Moderna Museet and Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and Malmö Konstmuseum.
PREVIEW RECEPTION: THURSDAY, OCTOBER 28, 6 – 8 PM
Image:
Lars Arrhenius
The Street, 2004
still from digital animation on DVD
6 1/2 minutes, edition of 4
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Dawn Clements
Dawn Clements explores a world of interiors, arduously rendering either her own immediate environment in a series of detailed and expressive drawings or capturing the staged sets of films and soap operas by continually replaying and carefully observing them.
Her recent drawing, “Travels with Myra Hudsonâ€, will span 46 feet in the Lower Gallery. This panoramic ink on paper depicts the many interior spaces that the main character inhabited in the 1952 film, “Sudden Fearâ€. The drawing reads like a series of large film cells or a storyboard with one scene leading to the next. Notations and observations are drawn in the borders, like clues about an implied narrative dropped along the way.
Smaller works will focus on the close proximity and familiarity of the artist’s home. A drawing of her desktop reflects her continued concentration on the domestic interior and its personal contents. The dynamic quality of Clements’ line and the intensity of her vision create drawings that, regardless of the scale, make one wish the picture would continue on.
Clements’ installation is in collaboration with an exhibition of her works at PIEROGI, November 19 - December 20, at 177 N 9th Street, Brooklyn, NY, 11211, http://www.pierogi2000.com.
PREVIEW RECEPTION: THURSDAY, OCTOBER 28, 6 – 8 PM
Feigen Contemporary
535 West 20th Street, New York, NY 10011