Demand and Morimura
dal 15/2/2002 al 9/6/2002
Segnalato da
15/2/2002
Demand and Morimura
SITE Santa Fe, Santa Fe
Demand bases his works on actual places, though his photographs are re-creations of settings made almost exclusively from paper and cardboard. Demand's photographs refer to absent protagonists, the now-empty and rather ordinary settings they once inhabited, and the often tangled events that occurred within these places. The exhibition of Demand contains 13 large-scale photographs and one 35mm film by the artist. Yasumasa Morimura in the Projection Room: Dialogue with Myself (Encounter), a video projection piece that pays homage to the extraordinary Mexican artist Frida Kahlo
Thomas Demand
Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA -- SITE Santa Fe
presents Thomas Demand, organized by the
Aspen Art Museum and curated by Dean Sobel,
which will be on view from February 16 through
June 2, 2002. There will be a
gallery talk with Thomas Demand on Saturday,
February 16 at 5 pm.
Thomas Demand bases his works on actual
places, though his photographs are re-creations
of settings made almost exclusively from paper
and cardboard. Upon close scrutiny, it becomes
apparent that details are missing, elements are
approximated, and everything has a hint of
peculiarity. Demand doles out information in
small portions, and he provides few clues or
referents that allow simple readings of his
prosaic images. Demand's photographs refer to
absent protagonists, the now-empty and rather
ordinary settings they once inhabited, and the
often tangled events that occurred within these
places. These photographs are pictures of
absence -- intricate mysteries that pose
questions about things that are not apparent in
the work.
Although Demand thwarts the tradition of
photography as a faithful recorder of people,
places, and events, he is interested in
uncovering the neutralizing effect the media has
on our culture and exploring how news is subject
to a host of biases, distortions, and
interpretations that affect how we receive
information and deduce meaning about events.
Demand carefully creates and stages the
settings for his photographs, and uses the same
basic materials for all of his models, thereby
giving his images a presumed uniformity and
objectivity. For example, the work Poll (2001) is
based on the Palm Beach County Emergency
Operations Center where the 2000 presidential
race recounts were staged. However, Poll is not
meant to be a photograph of the Florida recount,
but rather a picture about the events surrounding
the recount, and how media images can fail at
relaying a complete story about an incident.
The exhibition contains 13 large-scale
photographs and one 35mm film by the artist.
The exhibition is organized by the Aspen Art
Museum, where major funding was provided by
the AAM National Council and Sotheby's.
Additional support was provided by Charles and
Peggy Balbach, Elizabeth L. Barbatelli, Frannie
Dittmer in memory of Randy Beier, Dick and
Sylvia Kaufman, Nancy and Dr. Robert C.
Magoon, Dennis and Debra Scholl, Paul and
June Schorr, Paul and Gayle Stoffel, and the
Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen, e.V., Stuttgart.
The exhibition's travel schedule is as follows:
ArtPace, San Antonio, Texas (September
6-November 25, 2001); Aspen Art Museum,
Aspen, Colorado (December 14, 2001-January
27, 2002); SITE Santa Fe, Santa Fe, New
Mexico (February 16, 2002-June 2, 2002); De
Appel, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
(September 15-November 11, 2002).
Thomas Demand has had one-person
exhibitions at the Tate Gallery, London, England;
Kunsthalle, Zürich, Switzerland; and Fondation
Cartier, Paris, France. Although his work has
been shown in group exhibitions in this country
at museums that include The Museum of Modern
Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim
Museum, New York; Walker Art Center,
Minneapolis; and the Carnegie Museum of Art,
Pittsburgh, this will be Demand's first major
one-person museum exhibition in the United
States.
Thomas Demand, a full-color catalogue
published by the Aspen Art Museum, in
collaboration with De Appel Amsterdam,
accompanies the exhibition. It includes essays in
English and in German by Dean Sobel and Lars Lerup ($24.95).
Concurrently with THOMAS DEMAND, SITE
Santa Fe presents a DVD projection in the
Projection Room by YASUMASA MORIMURA
entitled Dialogue with Myself (Encounter)
(2001).
Yasumasa Morimura
Site Santa Fe Presents
Yasumasa Morimura:
Dialogue with Myself (Encounter)
February 16 - April 28, 2002
Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA - SITE Santa Fe
presents YASUMASA MORIMURA'S Dialogue
with Myself (Encounter) (2001), a DVD
installation that will run from February 16 through
April 28, 2002 in SITE Santa Fe's new
Projection Room.
Morimura's video projection piece, Dialogue
with Myself (Encounter), pays homage to the
extraordinary Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. The
DVD projection is part of a new series of
photographic works entitled An Inner Dialogue
with Frida Kahlo, in which Morimura becomes
Frida Kahlo to reveal her world. On screen,
Morimura plays the roles of Frida Kahlo, shown
in various personas and hairdos, as well as that
of her male accompanist, who sits beside her
playing an electronic keyboard (using
compositions by Morimura himself), while Kahlo
shouts out Spanish words and phrases.
Morimura re-creates, relives, and indulges in the
painter's artistic process, vividly depicting the
glamorous yet agonizing life of this remarkable
woman. He describes Kahlo's art as a "fierce
and intense manifestation of human sentiments
and universal themes, such as joy, anger,
sorrow, happiness, beauty, life and love."
Morimura has won international acclaim for his
unique and avant-garde expression of "beauty."
His images are rooted in Japanese Kabuki
theatre, where male actors play female parts.
Since 1985, his focus has been his
"self-portrait" series, consisting of unique
reconstructions of art masterpieces in which the
subject's face is substituted with Morimura's.
Through careful study and analysis of the
themes, artists, and historical background of
these works, he searches out their raison d'être
and transforms them according to his own
interpretations. His ability to deconstruct,
subvert, and simultaneously create an homage
is what enables his work to continually defy
categorization. Lynn Gumpert in Art in America
states: "Morimura's contribution to the genre of
self-portraiture is substantial. He approaches it
not only as a revelation of who he is, but as an
exploration of the limitless possibilities to be
whatever he wants."
Morimura has shown extensively in international
solo exhibitions, and his work is in the following
selected collections: The Museum of
Contemporary Art, Tokyo; The Carnegie
Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; The Modern Art
Museum, Fort Worth; Museo Nacional Centro de
Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid; The Museum of Fine
Arts, Boston; and The San Francisco Museum of
Modern Art.
Image: Studio, 1997. C-print mounted on Diasec 72 3/8 x 137 1/2 inches La Coleccion Jumex
More informations: Anne Wrinkle
SITE Santa Fe is located at 1606 Paseo de Peralta, Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Exhibition hours are Wednesday through Sunday, 10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.; Friday, 10:00 a.m. - 7:00 p.m.