Thursday, December 10, 2009

Matter & Memory at Wood Street Galleries -- through 12/31

Matter and Memory the US debut of French installation artist Julien Marie at Wood Street Galleries through 12/31/09



Both images of LES INSTANTENES [1998] in the 3d floor gallery.

This piece resonates with the Gregory Barsamian works seen at Wood St. in 2003 (my response to that show can be read here). Slides of actual glass objects are projected on the gallery wall, animating because they cross the threshold of motion in the mind's eye. The work in this show dances elegantly around the issue of re-presenting reality.

Why do we trust this media we have made?

Exploding Camera [2007] uses a historical event (a Taliban assassination of a northern Afghan warlord using a video camera that was ostensibly present to interview him) as a starting point for a complex installation evocative of too many things to describe here. Signals of violence, control, memory, communication, authority, authorship, and the power of story, all emanate from the work.

Model for the Apocalypse [2008] is a confounding, sensual, participatory piece that reminds us of Eliot's admonition, "The world ends not with a bang but a whimper." I'm not going to physically describe this because I want you to go see it and play with it - it does some very strange things.

Take a break from your holiday shopping, spend some time in the Wood St. Gallery with this remarkable body of work. You won't stop thinking about it for quite some time.

1 comment:

Jim said...

I've seen it, really nice.