Double Vision
Artistic Synergy Effects at the Lobby
Gallery, New York
In its new exhibition Double Vision,
the Lobby Gallery at Deutsche Bank in New York presents the work of
international artistic partnerships. Among them are established names such
as the duo Fischli and Weiss and siblings Claudia and Julia Mueller. But
there also new stars in the art scene, the artists' collective assume
vivid astro focus.
Fischli
und Weiss, Funghi 11, 1998
Deutsche
Bank Collection
Since the late '70s, Fischli
and Weiss have confronted the public with bizarre sausage still lifes,
filmed chain reactions and odd sculptures. Their work deliberately
explores the border between absurd humor and profundity. The Swiss duo
also subversively questions the roles of both viewer and artist. Their
photo series Funghi from the Deutsche
Bank Collection shows close-up images of mushrooms sprouting from a
forest floor. The work was generated in an idiosyncratic way: first, one
of the pair photographed the mushrooms. Then the other took the camera and
photographed the same motif. The result is almost psychedelic double
exposures that call to mind the hallucinogenic substances in some
mushrooms. The photos allow space for coincidence, thus calling the role
of the artist as the sole author of an artwork into question.
Fischli
und Weiss, Funghi 29, 1998
Deutsche
Bank Collection
Fischli and Weiss' ironic
fungal idyll can now be seen at the Lobby
Gallery of Deutsche Bank New York – in an exhibition that presents an
alternative to the romantic image of the artist as a lone, heroic creative
genius. With Double Vision, curator Liz
Christensen shows eleven international positions where teamwork and
synergies define the artistic work. Whether the artists working together
are siblings, romantic partners or friends, the works created are
collaborations.
Mixed
media installation by artist collective assume vivid astro focus
in
the reception area at Deutsche Bank Wall Street
To
set the mood for the show, a giant multi-media screen by
Brazilian-American artists' collective assume
vivid astro focus is the first thing visitors see upon entering the
building on Wall Street. It's a psychedelic patchwork of ornament, color
and shapes, upon which neon circles flash. assume vivid astro focus sample
nearly anything in their work: wallpaper patterns, graffiti, Tibetan
mandalas, soft-core porn motifs, Pink Floyd, Francis Picabia. Since its
founding in 2003, the group has had a comet like rise and has shown at
biennials and in museums around the world. One reason for this success is
surely the group's ability to build networks and absorb very diverse
influences.
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Aziz + Cucher, Oda 1, 2003
Courtesy
Kathleen Cullen Fine Art, NY and the Artists
Keith
Haring once described collaborating on artwork
as the "invention of a third consciousness – two psyches combined to
produce a third, unique form of awareness." For Haring – who in the 1980s
collaborated with fellow artists such as Jenny
Holzer, Yoko Ono and Andy
Warhol – as well as for many of the participants in Double Vision,
cooperation is not only about developing new artistic strategies; it's
also about questioning social and moral norms.
Aziz
+ Cucher, Nocturn 3, 2004
Courtesy
Kathleen Cullen Fine Art, NY and the Artists
Pioneers
of digitally manipulated photography Anthony
Aziz and Sammy Chucher have lived together since 1991. The New Yorkers
attracted attention with their photo series Dystopia (1994), in
which they showed human faces covered with flawless digital skin. The duo
removed the mouths, nostrils and eyes from the anonymous portraits,
erasing not only each unique feature, but also the sensory organs with
which humans experience their surroundings. Here, digital photography
anticipates the genetic manipulation of the human body. At the same time,
Aziz and Cucher provided a statement on the AIDS crisis in mid-90s
America, commenting on suppressed fears, speechlessness and social
isolation with their Abject
Art-related works. In their current project, Synaptic Bliss,
from which the works shown in Double Vision originate, they venture
further into the micro- and macrocosms. The cells or crystalline
structures on their metal prints seem like impressionistic, toxic
landscapes and dissolve the boundaries between the external and internal,
the organic and artificial.
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Lovett / Codagnone, I am/not you,
2004
Courtesy Emi Fontana,
Milan, West of Rome, LA and the artists
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As with Aziz and Chucher, the works of Lovett/Codagnone
and Elmgreen
and Dragset also deal with homosexual identity and alternatives to
traditional roles. In their videos, performances and photo projects,
Lovett/Codagnone address sexual and social power structures. Their
exciting productions combine elements of the gay S&M subculture with
literary, cinematic and political fragments, plumbing extreme physical and
psychological circumstances. Their series of drawings entitled For You
is based on a performance in which both artists held a double-edged knife
in their mouths while remaining frozen in a tango move for hours.
Lovett/Codagnone's latest works are about propaganda and subversive
anti-propaganda and the interface between publicly regulated and
autonomous cultures. Obliquities is the name of their text collage
made up of writings by Antonin Artaud and Peter Handke. It forms the basis
of their latest video work, currently on display at the solo show Interruption
of a Course of Action at New York's P.S.1.
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