Not
since the construction of City Creek Center has there been such a racket on
West Temple. Eight videos in UMOCA’s summer exhibition Cantastoria are creating quite a ruckus in the usually hushed
galleries, as a cacophony of chanting, giggling and clicking converges in the
subterranean galleries. For those accustomed to more traditional media, video
can be bewildering, if not outright alienating. This, I suspect, has something
to do with the old adage “familiarity breeds contempt.” As the preeminent mode
of communication for most folks, the video stream looms so large in the
American psyche, that anything other than the status quo is often unwelcome.
Luckily, the works in Cantastoria tread
gently. They don’t project agitprop onto building facades (see Krzysztof
Wodiczko), or onto tormented little effigies (Tony Oursler). We are not required
to deconstruct the baroque gesticulations of Bill Viola, or the primal chants
of Bruce Nauman. No, the works on view at UMOCA are enough to get our feet wet,
but not crack our brains. In fact, most works employ a static,
documentary-style shot that projects an ‘invisible window’ onto the world, much
like TV. Unlike TV, there is no staging, and editing is kept to a minimum.
Indeed, most of
the videos in Cantastoria are married
to the performance they document, rather than the specificities of the medium.
“Exercise” by Lucia Nimcova (2007) showcases senior citizens in Slovakia who
re-enact daily exercise routines that were introduced as a national health
program by the State. As such, the works present a concept of the body that is
inscribed by political ideology, while offering a window into communist life.
No attempt is made to idealize the protagonists’ bodies, their shapes contrast
those of American sport icons. Nor do they exercise in high-tech studios or
gyms, but in modest homes, offices and churches. A train conductor does arm
lifts from a baggage rail, a woman does sit-ups on her couch, housewives in headscarves
and smocks touch their toes. Clearly the act of revisiting these movements
triggers happy memories. As they giggle and chuckle, their pleasure is
contagious (to the viewer) and forms an instant connection which transcends our
demonized view of communism. This stands in sharp contrast to the highly
regimented nature of our own form of exercise, and presents new connections
between the body and freedom, health and happiness.
“The History of
the Typewriter Recited by Michael Winslow, 2009” documents a series of vignettes performed by the “man of 10000
sound effects,” Michael Winslow. Armed with only a microphone, headphones and
his superhuman mouth, we watch as Winslow stretches and contorts his mandible
to mimic the sounds of typewriter machines built between 1895 and 1983. The
result is comparable to the a capella
acrobatics of Bobby McFerrin. Yet Winslow essentially automates himself,
transforming himself into a robot of sorts. This reading is tempered by the
artist’s own foibles, as he spits, sputters and gasps through the performance.
While Winslow
works his way through the typewriter models, the sentence he ‘types’ remains
unchanged : “The History of the Typewriter Recited by Michael Winslow, 2009.” Because the sentence doesn’t change,
the audience is able to decipher unique sounds that distinguish each model. The
results range from the choppy slam of keys on a rubber roller, to the sleeker
muffles of ‘noiseless’ electronic machines. As such, the work is not only a
paean to the more mechanistic side of twentieth century business life
(predating the sleek screens of today), but pays tribute to a buried dimension
of the office that must have characterized modern working life. The work’s
circuitousness presents a conundrum; the object under consideration is
conspicuously absent, yet is beautifully resurrected in the intersection of text
and sound.
A
solo-exhibition of Christian Jankowski’s “Casting Jesus” (2011) documents a
real-life casting call hosted by papal officiates in the Roman Vatican. Not
since the Second Council of Nicaea (AD 787) have a group of men gathered to
discuss the image of Christ with such ... devotion. Critiquing various actors who’ve answered ‘the call’ to
portray Him, we witness the reenactment of iconic New Testament moments in the
story of Christ. Barefoot and bearded, the contenders feign piety and pathos
not from any inherent religiosity, but to appease the selection committee and
land a job. Such a transparent window into the machinations of the Vatican
leaves even this Jew wondering : is nothing sacred? The results are definitely camp. (Or, in Utah parlance,
‘inappropriate.’) Unfortunately, we all know the outcome. For, despite the
candidates’ efforts, Christianity is like a game show : there can be only one
that rises to the top.
As the reaction
of committee members shifts from applause to disapproval, the subjective nature
of their comments becomes evident; they are no more experts in the life of
Christ than we are. In this way, another reality starts to dawn. Jesus is no
more the embodiment of the Truth than a cultural construction carefully
gerrymandered by religious leaders. For devotees of the moral majority, to say
nothing of the Holy See and Pontificate, this conclusion is nothing short of
scandalous. As such, UMOCA should be congratulated for bringing us such
potentially contentious work. And yes, cracking our brains just a little.
Unlike the above
works, which document performances by artists or the public, Omer Fast’s CNN Concatenated (2002) intervenes with the video stream to form a collage of
sorts. Specifically, second-long frames from a CNN broadcast, each the length
of a single word, are isolated and then reassembled to form whole, lengthy
sentences. Initially appearing incoherent, the words stutter along while the
journalist, background and NYSE ticker leap from frame to frame. While these
elements remain in flux, various phrases in the dialogue start to surface and
repeat themselves until we eventually see the forest through the trees, and
whole sentences emerge. Harking back to conspiracy theories claiming a hidden,
subliminal message, this secret dialogue is at times confessional and
soul-searching. Like the Truisms of
Jenny Holzer, it asks pejorative questions, yet is infused with Freudian
psychobabble, as if the speaker and viewer might be in couple’s counseling.
“How did we get to this point? Where did we go wrong?” and “You’re so cynical.
Is it your anxiety making you do this? That’s so typical of your generation.”
However self-critical the statements are, the speaker’s search for answers is undermined
by the segmented editing. And is incongruous for a national broadcast. Such
tactics undermine the authority of the CNN broadcast that, as an arbiter of
world events, has become a kind of Big Brother. No surprise that the artist is from
Israel, a place heavily inscribed by media narratives.
The works on
view until Sept.22 at UMOCA offer an excellent introduction to the wonderful
world of video art. But it is just the tip of the iceberg. Looking further
afield, half a century of production has yielded a voluminous body of work that
plays a vital role in the life of art, worldwide. Since Salt Lake City offers
no independent, artist-run production studio, and the subject is sidelined as ‘new media’ in most Utah art departments,
UMOCA has an educational imperative to raise the bar : Cantastoria is a step in the right direction.
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