They Go Round and Round

0047
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with AIDS-3D (US), Caitlin Berrigan (US), Daisy Ginsberg (UK), Elín Hansdóttir (IS), Markus Miessen (DE), Nicolas Dusollier (FR), Paolo Chiasera (IT), Patricia Reed (CA), Ralf Pflugfelder (DE), Sabina Grasso (IT), Sascha Pohflepp (DE), Susanne Gerber (DE), Thomas Eller (DE) and Valerie Kolakis (CA)
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0047 is pleased to present They Go Round and Round curated by Carson Chan. They Go Round and Round is the second of two exhibitions curated by Carson Chan at 0047 dealing with the structures, tangible or otherwise, that pervade reality. Where And the Seasons explored the flux between physical and virtual space, myth and reality, and between abstract and concrete forms, They Go Round and Round will open the topic by adding the work of thirteen artists to the fray. In keeping with the exhibition’s theme, several of the pieces shown will purposely problematize the boundaries between the artworks, the gallery and the public sphere, and the blurred boundary between art and architecture. Upon entering the 0047, visitors are immediately confronted with Nicolas Dusollier’s Static Vehicle #2 (2010). A large back curve constructed out of laminated wood boards, the piece poses as a formal Modernist sculpture that visitors could interact with. It’s curve, calculated to produce a sinusoidal movement when stood upon, allows a physical sensation of the Pi function. In the same space, Sascha Pohflepp and Daisy Ginsberg’s Growth Assembly (2009), introduce the exhibitions’ theme of interpenetrating systems. Produced when they were students at the Royal College of Arts in London, these watercolor illustrations, rendered in the style of early-modern biology manuals, depict genetically modified plants that produce nuts and fruits which can be assembled into a herbicide sprayer – the proviso being that plants grown in the controlled environment of our technological future will loose their natural immunity. Paolo Chiasera’s Olographic Painting 1 (Robert Peel and Lady Lovelace) (2010), superimposes portraits of Robert Peel and Lady Lovelace (daughter English poet of Lord Byron) thousands of times, one upon another. Both being key people in Charles Babbage’s life, Chiasera introduces a sense of interconnectedness beyond the usual reference to Babbage as the inventor of the programmable computer. Babbage’s flash of inspiration is actualized as one enters the gallery. Tripping over a motion sensor, visitors activate a series of camera flashes in Valerie Kolakis’ installation The Fame Monster (2010). Logos (2009), by Aids-3d, combines cosmic history with out desire to make sense of the world into a simple display. An iron meteorite, which predates the Earth by tens of billions of years, sits atop a balance that shows its precise weight – 50.907 grams. Seen upside down, the number appears to read LOGOS, revealing the arbitrary nature of both language (logos), and the trust we put into our system of numbers. Also by Aids-3d is a sculpture of an alien, Berserker (2009). Sculpted out of Styrofoam by a digital milling machine, the alien appears to greet us with an outstretch arm, his hands holding a USB flash-memory stick, in which contains the digital file for his reproduction. In the same way the alien’s form continually loop between the physical and the virtual, the figure in Thomas Eller’s Selbst (2010) appears to linger between real and represented space. Markus Miessen and Ralf Pflugfelder’s Dubai Düsseldorf Kunsthalle (2009) is an artifact from their narrative fiction about the future of Dubai and Düsseldorf – their mandate to outlaw art and their desire to build monumental void structures to mark this decision. Also pitting nations together is Patricia Reed’s Pan-National Flag (2009). Hanging in the middle of the room, Reed’s flag is the combination of all the flag’s of all recognized nations – emerging in the center of which is a new form. Several of pieces in the exhibition will seemingly have no presence at all. Elin Hansdottir’s Peripheral (2006), which was shown previously as a special installation at the Frieze Art Fair, expresses this blurring by possessing an unmistakable presence while being completely immaterial. Attached to the sets of wall-wash lights on the gallery’s ceiling are colored gels that when combined create a white light, not unlike the light one would see illuminating any other gallery. We notice the piece only when we see the shadows cast by the other objects in the room; instead of darkness, the refracted shadows are a rainbow of reds, blues and greens. It could be said that with this piece, Hansdottir (b. 1980, Reykjavik, Iceland) pollutes the autonomy of the other works in the room. That artworks partially loose their autonomous status is the condition of every group exhibition. Caitlin Berrigan’s contribution, a sound piece heard throughout the exhibition space, combines empirical data with its attendant emotions. We hear a woman soberly counting numbers, a banal act until we realize she is counting the war dead in Iraq. The dispersal of artistic ideas into the public realm, and likewise the entry of the everyday world into the gallery space is a central concern to the exhibition. Susanne Gerber has been consistently exploring the means and modes of dispersing information. For the duration exhibition, she asks the staff at 0047 to use the A4 paper she has provided for all their office correspondences. On the backside of each sheet is printed a fragment of the E. Coli virus’ DNA sequence – data that Gerber obtained by hacking into the University of Wisconsin’s servers the day they completed the code. Existing completely outside the gallery, Sabina Grasso’s performance consists of actors playing the parts of Leon and Åsa throughout the duration of the exhibition in downtown Oslo. Taking the protagonists in Erik Poppe’s 2004 film Hawaii, Oslo, Grasso asked two actors to assume the roles of Leon and Åsa – Leon perpetually looking around Oslo for Åsa, and Åsa sitting at the Hawaii bar.
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