More info:

Icelandic festival of experimental films with a special theme SOUND vs. VIDEO this year: March 20 – 27, 2010.
700IS Reindeerland – International experimental film and video festival, in East Iceland.

If you get a chance…

The subject’s goal –what they are moving towards– is never elucidated. Perhaps the motivation for their struggle is solely to leave a remnant of their movement. If a line serves to map an action, how does the viewer’s perception change when the record of that action is available but the line is not?

Special thanks to Christopher Chung, Benjamin Katz and Laurie P.

Pro Arts presents the Juried Annual, an exhibition of its member artists that showcases new and emerging talent. This annual international juried exhibition is curated by Sherman Sam, London.

November 24, 2009 – January 15, 2010

Artists’ Reception: Thursday, December 3, 6 – 8 pm
Artists’ Talk: Thursday, January 14, 6 pm

The Fourth Annual Juried Show

Jurors: David Cunningham and Misako Inaoka

Featuring: Rand Colosky, Eric Larson, Liesa Lietzke, Hye Yeon Nam, Dominic Nguyen, Flynn O’Brien, Benji Rowan, Gretchen Till, Jessica Westbrook, and Alan Disparte & Yoram Wolberger(in collaboration with the AArrow Sign Spinners)

Opening Reception: Friday, September 18, 6-9pm
Exhibition Runs: September 18 – October 10, 2009
Gallery Hours: Wednesdays – Saturdays, 1-6pm

Syzygy, from the Late Latin (syzygia: conjunction), has slightly different meanings in astronomy, mathematics, music, philosophy, poetry, and other fields of inquiry, but generally can be defined as a kind of unity achieved through coordination or alignment of two or more things without the loss of identity.  In art, diverse ideas and forms are constantly challenged to be in syzygy as artists work with multivalent and sometimes oppositional concepts, materials, and/or approaches. Artists were chosen across a range of media based on their ability to exemplify the theme and bring further sensitivity and nuance to the already multifaceted definition of syzygy.

I am participating in a show at the Worth Ryder Gallery at UC Berkeley (116 Kroeber Hall) from July 14th–27th, 2009.
The OPENING RECEPTION is on Friday, July 17th, from 7–10pm.

This is my response to the theme of the show:

A Walk Through is an investigation into the dissolution of structure, both societal and physical. It is an artistic examination into modes of operation whose end results are obfuscated by social and cultural factors.

Infinite:Finite is a print on paper that deals with perception and the division between image and viewer. The faint landscapes beg the question of the very existence of form. Infinite:Finite is an exploration of both the perspectival space, a forced divide between viewer and the representation of tangible terrain, and a question of the significance of action when social, economic, and cultural concerns can be reduced to a distant speck on the horizon.

Gun is the reduction of an action to the human hand –a search for reality. It is an exercise in futility and a map of the accumulation of debris over time. The absurdity of throwing ash acts as a metaphor for man’s obsession with the unattainable, offering a glimpse at base human nature. The aggression of the gun is echoed by the hand’s sudden arrival into the frame, yet its insufficiency is quickly revealed by the ephemeral nature of the ash. Gun demonstrates a discontinuity in the paradigm of cause and effect, where the hostile action produces a passive result.
(Gun is a collaboration between Dominic Nguyen & David Whitaker)

On a side note: I also had the opportunity to design the flier. The graphic is based on an aerial view of an ad hoc parking situation outside of any formal environment. It makes me wonder if the tendency towards order exists when the structure does not. What is it that conditions humanity into parking in straight lines?

Hope to see you there!

Click for a PDF of the catalogue:
A Walk Through Show Catalogue

The image is captured from a video David Whitaker and I are working on titled gun.

Leave the Capital is an exhibition of art and media dealing with the agency of the periphery—beyond political, economic, and media centers. The 13 artists in the show offer a critical mix of observation, confrontation, urban intervention, hybridity, and cathartic celebration in order to assert the self and counter-publics. This is a timely investigation in the face of current economic restructuring. Re-considerations of the role of the public sphere and the individual within larger machines of production are more relevant than ever.

The title is taken from a 1981 song by UK post-punk band The Fall (who in turn are named after the Camus novel The Fall). The song is a starting point from which to investigate how artists address and break off from the need to perform for “Capital,” represented in the widest sense of the word—as money, media, power, rules, lines, roles, etc. The exhibition presents artists negotiating between the demands of the centers of power and the possibilities presented by secondary zones and identities in the Bay Area, Los Angeles, Stanislaus, Amsterdam and elsewhere.