Charles Broskoski
Marcel Dionne
Ida Ekblad
Marius Engh
Simon Goldin
Jakob Senneby
Curated by Hanne Mugaas
La Vitrine, Paris, April 5 - May 4, 2007. Opening Reception April 4 at 18:00.
In 1925 Janet Flanner started sending her letters describing the social life of Paris to the magazine the New Yorker. Her letters were stories of what happened yesterday, stories which through her distribution got refined into pieces of history. By distributing what seemed to be only social gossip, and through her understanding of the importance of the personal story set within a bigger context, her letters gave an incomparable view of French political, social, and cultural life at the time.
Today, history is written and rewritten every day by numerous contributors, and through technology quickly distributed. Everyday stories create a bigger picture, which in turn expands the historic archive. In a world that is extensively mediated and constructed, issues of distribution and the technology that allows images to have impact are increasingly important. The artists in Paris was Yesterday take their recent history, investigate it, and twist it around to make us aware of how history is created, and how terms such as technology, culture and art are intertwined in the quest to gain the attention of the increasingly distracted receiver/ consumer.
In "After Microsoft", Simon Goldin and Jakob Senneby searched for the photographer of the standard Microsoft desktop image, and had him photograph and photoshop the scene once more, such questioning the give and take of art and commerce. In the video "Infinity x 10", Charles Broskoski alters future fantasies. Broskoski has written a computer program to play the "Infinity and beyond"-scene of the movie "2001" 10 times over with a 5 second difference between each instance, to complicate and aestheticize its imagery. In similar turns, Ida Ekblad's "National Geographic" reorganizes 20 years of clippings from the nature and science magazine National Geographic to further increase its glossy version of nature. Ekblad and Marius Engh's sculpture "Larissa, Proteus, Triton, Nereid" explores the moons of the planet Neptune through found sports equipment, such commenting on the moon's place and usage within popular culture. Marius Engh's collage "Untitled (Coat) / Untitled (Words)" investigates the crossword and its resemblance to the concept of the grid and its associations to modernistic painting. Marcel Dionne's "Guitar Pick" brings Dimedag Darrell's, the legendary guitarist of Pantera, guitar pick to the exhibition to question the gallery's ability to increase the cultural value of a ready-made. Dionne also presents "Rockawear/ I Love Tchaikovsky" a collage which comments on the usage and value of contemporary imagery and music.
LaVitrine, 24 rue Moret, F- 75011 Paris. Métro : Parmentier . Couronnes . Ménilmontant. The gallery is open from Wednesday through Saturday from 2 to 6, and by appointment. For more info, please contact Matthieu Clainchard matthieu.clainchard@ensapc.fr tel/fax : +33 (0) 1.43.38.49.65 or Mathilde Villeneuve mathilde.villeneuve@ensapc.fr
The exhibition is supported by Office for Contemporary Art Norway and IASPIS.
Biographies
Ida Ekblad (b. 1980 in Oslo, lives and works in Oslo) is an artist and one of the initiators of the gallery Willy Wonka Inc. Ekblad has participated in exhibitions at Raid Projects in Los Angeles, White Columns in New York, and Queens Nails Annex in San Fransisco. She is at present curating a show for Karma International in Zurich, and an exhibition about The Cockettes that will take place in Oslo during the Fall.
Simon Goldin and Jakob Senneby's (b. 1981 and 1971, live and work in Stockholm) practice focuses on the immaterialization of contemporary society, the emergence of a network economy and the virtualization of labor. Recent exhibitions include The Moscow Biennial 2007, Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Whitney Museum Artport in New York, and Art Basel Miami. They are currently working on an upcoming show at Portikus in Frankfurt am Main.
Marius Engh (born 1974. Lives and works in Oslo, Norway) recent works has been shown at "Dice Thrown (Will Never Annul Chance)", Bellwether Gallery, New York, "All Items Must Fit in Basket", Standard (Oslo), Oslo, "Street: Behind the Cliché", Witte de With Contemporary Art Center, Rotterdam, "Villa Jelmini - The Complex of Respect", Kunsthalle Bern, Bern.
Charles Broskoski (born 1982, lives and works in New York) is a student of Design and Technology at Parsons School of Design in New York. His work has been exhibited at Second Gallery in Boston, and showcased on Rhizome.org at The New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York. He is a member of the online art communities Supercentral.org and Lion King, where he puts up 90's style splash images a couple of times a week.
Marcel Dionne is an artist and online persona with several contributors, created by a group of people from New York.
Hanne Mugaas is an independent curator based in New York. Recent projects include "Take it to the Net" for Vilma Gold in London, "Techniques of Today" for MIACA in Yokohama, and "The Copy and Paste Show" for Rhizome.org / New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York. Mugaas is also a research assistant to Associate Curator Barbara London in the Film and Video department at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York. www.hanne-mugaas.com