| P.S.1 Contemporary
Art Center is proud to present new Special Projects on June
27, 2004, including works by Walead Beshty, Johnston Foster,
Marepe, Mika Rottenberg, and Jenny Vogel. Special Projects
are selected individually, without attention to a theme
in order to reflect the extraordinary energy and variety
of practices among young artists working in New York City
and abroad.
Walead Beshty
Floor 3, Archive Room. Selected by P.S.1 Curatorial Advisor
Bob Nickas.
Over the past three years, Los Angeles-based artist and
critic Walead Beshty has been photographing “dead
malls,” malls which have been abandoned as larger
retailers lured stores and shoppers away. The artist has
described these spaces as possessing “an overwhelming
uncanniness; devoid of people, stripped of most, if not
all, of the façade signage, they have the feeling
of eerily deserted scenes from war torn countries or derelict
inner cities.” Beshty takes a conceptual/documentary
approach to the pictorial essay, and sees the dead malls
as “swiftly becoming our own modern ruins.”
Also on view is a series of photographs taken at active
malls during regular business hours. Here, the artist appears
with his head completely inserted into merchandise and store
displays. These pictures offer a comic/absurd counterpoint
to the dead malls.
Walead Beshty is an artist and writer currently based in
Los Angeles. He received his BA from Bard College in Photography
(1999), and his MFA from Yale School of Art (2002). In 2004
his work appeared in Self Evidence: Identity in Contemporary
Art, DeCordova Museum, Lincoln MA; Buy American, Gallerie
Chez Valentin, Paris; Cool Intentions, Sandroni Rey gallery,
Los Angeles; Behind Closed Doors, Katonah Museum of Art,
Katonah NY; Upstream: Idea Drawings Hayworth Gallery, Los
Angeles; and has an upcoming solo exhibition at Wallspace
Gallery in New York. He currently teaches in the Art Department
of the California Institute of the Arts, and the University
of California at Los Angeles.
Johnston Foster: The Permanent Vacation 2004
Floor 2, Gallery S204, Selected by P.S.1 Assistant Curator
Amy Smith Stewart
For P.S.1, New York-based artist Johnston Foster presents
The Permanent Vacation, a new site-specific installation
that consists of a life-sized mechanical Jacuzzi occupied
by four ghostly creatures and situated in a lush yard of
synthetic grass, rose bushes and artificial freshly cut
tree stumps. Using bold and playful colors and varied materials,
Foster combines allusions to the mundane experiences of
every individual with remnants of pop culture, humor, and
various windows into his personal lifestyle. By using a
wide variety of media, including plastic pots, novelty motors
and various everyday items, he illuminates inveterate notions
of high art.
Johnston Foster (b. 1978, South Boston, VA) is currently
completing a MFA Hunter College and received a BFA from
Virginia Commonwealth University in 2001. Solo exhibitions
include: "New Work," RARE, New York (2004); "Plot
Thickener," Ipenema Gallery, Richmond, VA (2001) and
"Trouble Everyday," Virginia Commonwealth Gallery,
Richmond, VA (2000).
Mika Rottenberg, Mary’s Cherries 2004
Floor 2, Gallery S201, Selected by P.S.1 Assistant Curator
Amy Smith Stewart
Israeli artist Mika Rottenberg's work comments on global
themes such as cultural identity, economy and bodily perception.
For P.S.1, Mika Rottenberg presents Mary’s Cherries,
a new site-specific video installation. The video depicts
three female wrestlers performing a series of bodily actions
in a three-floor factory. Two women on the bottom floor
rapidly pedal at a stationary table triggering a UV light
that promotes red nail growth. The nail falls through a
hole onto the second floor and another laborer massages
and rubs it to stimulate its next stage of development.
When it finally lands on the bottom floor, the nail metamorphoses
into the end product: a maraschino cherry.
Rottenberg, who lives and works in New York City, received
a B.F.A. from the School of Visual Arts in 2000 and an M.F.A.
from Columbia University in 2004. Exhibitions since 1999
include "Spring at the End of the Summer, a group exhibition
at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel; "Short Cuts",
at the Luggage Space Gallery in San Francisco; "Paladar",
the Cuban Biennial, 2000 in Havana; "Projects 2001"
at the Islip Museum, LIC, New York, 2001; "Tensionism"
at Perry Street Rove, NYC, 2003; "My Sources Say Yes"
at Guild & Greyshkul gallery, NYC, 2003, Art Basel Miami,
2003, Miami; and the Armory Show in NYC in 2003.
Jenny Vogel (2004)
Floor 2, Gallery S202, Selected by P.S.1 Assistant Curator
Amy Smith Stewart
New York-based German artist Jenny Vogel explores the world
as viewed through new media technology. Vogel has made short
videos using web cameras, streaming news channels and Google
searches as source material. For P.S.1, Vogel presents a
new video work in which, rather than using previously recorded
material, she imports imagery from existing live web cameras
that will update the video throughout the duration of the
exhibition. Thus, the video will change upon each viewing,
depending on the light and weather conditions of each camera
and the activities in the cameras' visual fields. In this
way, Vogel relinquishes her ability to control the imagery
in front of her audience. The video is accompanied by a
pre-recorded voice over, which will remain constant each
time the video is seen, linking the images together to form
a continuous narrative.
Jenny Vogel (b. 1975 Nuremberg, Germany) currently lives
and works in New York. She received a BFA and a MFA in Combined
Media at Hunter College. Group exhibitions and screenings
include: Year Gallery, New York (2004); The Block, Gallery
Une, Neuchatel, Switzerland (2004); Void, Educational Alliance,
New York (2004); Quixotic, Sling Shot Projects, New York
(2003); screening, NYU, New York (2003) and a screening,
Interflugs, Berlin, Germany (2002).
Marepe: Arca Azul de Noé, 2004
Floor 2, Gallery S203 Selected by P.S.1 Curator Jimena Blazquez.
Marepe’s work has evolved from a deep connection with
the local traditions, customs, and materials of Bahia, the
Northeastern region of Brazil. In creating his works, the
artist employs the specificities of his environmental milieu,
and safeguards them as memory. As Marepe often uses readymade
materials, as well as everyday objects or activities, his
work has acquired a complex layering of references and meanings
addressing the linkage between the individual and society.
The appropriation, deployment, and dislocation of the object
are the artist’s points of departure as he searches
for new modes of signification.
For P.S.1 Marepe presents Arca Azul de Noé, a work
that acts as a metaphor for everyday life. The arch is the
primary representation of an archaic universe, carrying
within itself individuals, symbolically represented by disposable
plastic cups, which may be observed through a metal grid
affixed to the top of the arch. The cyclical movement undergone
by the cups, which are damaged by the activation of the
wood lever, is provided by the physical effort expended
by the spectator’s moving the handle, driving the
whole system into motion, and thereby producing a slightly
disturbing sound.
Born 1970 in San Antonio de Jesus, Bahia, Brazil, Marepe
lives and works in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil. In addition
to participating in various group exhibitions including
the Istanbul Biennial, 2004; solo exhibitions include the
Luisa Strina Gallery, Sao Paulo, Brazil, (2000); Hoof of
Horse, Gallery Acbeu, Rescuer, Brazil, (1995); and It has
Folder, if Coast? It Does Not Deny Crossbow, Has Bosta!
You Like? But That Reply, It’s Coast, Restaurant Cia
of the Indians, Rescuer, Brazil, (1994).
Special thanks to Galeria Luisa Strina, Sao Paolo, Brasil
and Anton Kern Gallery, New York.
For more information, please
contact Rachael Dorsey, P.S.1 Press Office, at press@ps1.org
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