Ed Atkins at MoMA PS1
January 20 — April 1, 2013
PS1 is hosting the first solo show in the United States of British artist Ed Atkins. Akins works with filmic and text-based forms that are in technological transition. The artist considers HD technology deathlike because of its virtualized form and he deploys the bodiless movie formant to hightlight the conflicting intimacies that contemporary mechanisms of cultural production represent and allow us to achieve. Unlike traditional films with prioritize the image of the soundtrack, Atkins gives equal importance to what is seen and heard, playing visual conventions against those of sound composition and editing. Sudden transitions mark his work, drawing out attention to the artifice of contemporary 'film' in its accelerating transition to new digital formants capable of remarkable kinds of simulation .
Atkins semi-narrative video work “Warm, Warm, Warm Spring Mouths,” a single-channel work created this year, and “Us Dead Talk Love,” a two-channel installation accompanied by large collage drawings should be familiar to any active browser of the avant-garde internet. His human forms, most often a floating head that seems to be a self-portrait, are presented firmly within the uncanny valley: extremely high resolution, super detailed, but always somehow off. The texture of the skin isn’t quite real; the limbs and joints don’t fit together. It’s part of the dominant style of a certain generation of digital artists (Atkins is 30 years old) who take inspiration from the imperfect graphic engines of video games like The Sims and software like Maya.
January 20 — April 1, 2013
PS1 is hosting the first solo show in the United States of British artist Ed Atkins. Akins works with filmic and text-based forms that are in technological transition. The artist considers HD technology deathlike because of its virtualized form and he deploys the bodiless movie formant to hightlight the conflicting intimacies that contemporary mechanisms of cultural production represent and allow us to achieve. Unlike traditional films with prioritize the image of the soundtrack, Atkins gives equal importance to what is seen and heard, playing visual conventions against those of sound composition and editing. Sudden transitions mark his work, drawing out attention to the artifice of contemporary 'film' in its accelerating transition to new digital formants capable of remarkable kinds of simulation .
Atkins semi-narrative video work “Warm, Warm, Warm Spring Mouths,” a single-channel work created this year, and “Us Dead Talk Love,” a two-channel installation accompanied by large collage drawings should be familiar to any active browser of the avant-garde internet. His human forms, most often a floating head that seems to be a self-portrait, are presented firmly within the uncanny valley: extremely high resolution, super detailed, but always somehow off. The texture of the skin isn’t quite real; the limbs and joints don’t fit together. It’s part of the dominant style of a certain generation of digital artists (Atkins is 30 years old) who take inspiration from the imperfect graphic engines of video games like The Sims and software like Maya.
The two pieces currently on display at MoMA PS1 are composed of high-definition, three-dimensional renderings of human figures and faces set onto flat compositions of color and digital collage. The texture of the skin isn’t quite real; the limbs and joints don’t fit together. It’s part of the dominant style of a certain generation of digital artists who take inspiration from the imperfect graphic engines of video games like The Sims and software like Maya. It is difficult to pin meanings onto Atkins’ semi-narrative video works. This is video art that you can’t blank out on; the mind constantly seeks the tail of the story and the turns of the plot. It’s a constant hide-and-seek for the viewer that forces aggressive attention. This is video art that you can’t blank out on; the mind constantly seeks the tail of the story and the turns of the plot. Both piece are presided over by central narrators who speak in fragments of poetry — “Us Dead Talk Love” by Atkins’s avatar and “Warm, Warm, Warm Spring Mouths” by a series of anonymous figures sitting on chairs sunk in an underwater environment.
Organized by Peter Eleey, Curator, MoMA PS1, with Matthew Evans, Curatorial Assistant.
On January the 20th, in conjunction with the opening of his exhibition, Ed Atkins presents a performance piece called Depression, about death, bodies, and disintegrating matter. The Winter Open House event includes the opening of Cyprien Gaillard: The Crystal World, Metahaven: Islands in the Cloud, Jeff Elrod: Nobody Sees Like Us and CONFETTISYSTEM: 100 Arrangements exhibitions. The opening celebration includes a program hosted by Gaillard (Cyprien Gaillard presents Egyptian Lover and Salem DJ set) a cash bar, and delicious eats provided by M. Wells.
Ed Atkins
January 20 — April 1, 2013
MoMA PS1
22-25 Jackson Ave. at the intersection of 46th Ave.
Long Island City, New York
www.momaps1.org
On January the 20th, in conjunction with the opening of his exhibition, Ed Atkins presents a performance piece called Depression, about death, bodies, and disintegrating matter. The Winter Open House event includes the opening of Cyprien Gaillard: The Crystal World, Metahaven: Islands in the Cloud, Jeff Elrod: Nobody Sees Like Us and CONFETTISYSTEM: 100 Arrangements exhibitions. The opening celebration includes a program hosted by Gaillard (Cyprien Gaillard presents Egyptian Lover and Salem DJ set) a cash bar, and delicious eats provided by M. Wells.
Ed Atkins
January 20 — April 1, 2013
MoMA PS1
22-25 Jackson Ave. at the intersection of 46th Ave.
Long Island City, New York
www.momaps1.org