DOUG AITKEN. BLACK MIRROR
19/01/2012.
[VIDEOS] Helga de Alvear Gallery [MAD] Spain 19.01.2011>10.03.2012
metalocus, INÉS LALUETA
metalocus, INÉS LALUETA
Californian artist Doug Aitken (Redondo Beach, 1968) presents, in Galería Helga de Alvear, his first commercial exhibition in Spain. His work is characterised by the widespread use of film technology and language. As media formats, he uses both photography and light boxes, but, doubtless, the most well-known aspect of his work are the installations based on moving images.
BlackMirror_still_06 - Doug Aitken, Black Mirror, 2011, Video Still. Copyright: Doug Aitken Inc. Image Courtesy of the DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art, Athens
Fotografía © Doug Aitken, Black Mirrors (2011).
Doug Aitken, Black Mirrors (2011). Image Courtesy of the DESTE Foundation for Contemporary Art.
Fotografía © Doug Aitken, Black Mirrors (2011).
Fotografía © Doug Aitken, Black Mirrors (2011).
Fotografía © Doug Aitken, Black Mirrors (2011).
Fotografía © Doug Aitken, Black Mirrors (2011).
Fotografía © Doug Aitken, Black Mirrors (2011).
“Black Mirror,” explores the placelessness and alienation of people in nonstop motion.
In the installation "Black Mirror", he portrays a whole nomadic generation, dependent on information, through a road movie, whose protagonist travels constantly from one place to another without revealing where they come from or there they're trying to get at, or why. With actress Chloë Sevigny in the leading role, her omnipresent figure traverses anonymous scenarios, but nevertheless ones loaded with connotations and references to travel and the contemporary anonymous world.
There's a succession of hotels and roads, as well as phone calls and technological references. In her dialogues with an unknown person, the protagonist refers to how short and banal her human contacts are, in contrast to the isolation and the great distances they need to cover. It is a portrait of our times, of people we hardly see in hospital corridors or at airports. The images shown in the five monitors are infinitely reflected in the mirrors, creating the effect of the story taking place innumerable times, and that anyone could be the protagonist. It could be anyone with a mindset summarised by the three words: "Exchange, connect and move on".
The exhibition is complemented by a series of recent photographs and light boxes. There, the artist continues in his exploration of contemporary society through the point of view of popular and mass culture. These are scenes or references that appear familiar (an airport, a sunset, an advertising billboard), especially in the Californian context that ranges all the way from Hollywood to Ed Ruscha. Nevertheless, by positing the point of view of the sublime, Aitken makes us look at them as if they themselves were an iconic image.
Aitken has exhibited his work at London's Serpentine Gallery, at Paris' Georges Pompidou Centre, and has taken part in the Whitney Biennial on two occasions. In 1999, he won the International Prize of the Venice Biennale. In 2007, he presented a mega-project in New York, "Sleepwalkers", where he would project images on the façade of the Museum of Modern Art building, turning it into a screen, a sculpture, and an installation at the same time.
Galería Helga de Alvear
Doctor Fourquet, 12
28012 Madrid
