Ghosts in the Machine at the New Museum
The New
Museum at 235 Bowery Street, dedicated to contemporary art, has chosen now to
tackle that most contemporary of subjects—technology, that is to say,
technology and its impact on humankind, which evidently is not always
positive. The new exhibition Ghosts in the Machine, running through
September 30, explores the good and evil of the human race’s dependence on our
various devices in extremely inventive and often incredibly intricate ways.
The star of
the exhibit, and perhaps a representation of everything it stands for, is Stan
VanDerBeek’s Movie-Drome, a 1963
converted silo roof plopped smack in the middle of one of the New Museum’s
Japanese-designed galleries. (The
galleries themselves are confusing and maze-like, but artsy in a Nouveau kind
of way.) Projected onto the inside of
the silo is an overwhelming assortment of images in varying stages of motion
and stasis, creating a dizzying and plot-devoid motion picture reminiscent of
the early IMAX dome films. VanDerBeek’s
initial intention was to install Dromes like
these all over the world through which to broadcast information specific to
each region. When this plan (for obvious
reasons) did not pan out, he instead used the Drome to display his multimedia presentations to his legions of
fans. The Drome could be used to broadcast propaganda to the masses, or to
display entertainment. Either use is
threatening, but in different ways.
Technology threatens to take over the world, and also change it in ways
that can never be reversed. Is it any
wonder some fear its advances?
Ghosts is simple and well organized, if
futuristic in an unfamiliar and slightly unnatural way. A few of the films shown can make one feel as
if one is experiencing a continuous intense migraine, and the pieces displayed
are not applied to practical usage, as in a similar exhibition, Talk to Me, at MoMA last year. They are merely meant to represent
technological impact, not cause it. A
prime example is Hans Haacke’s 1964 piece Blue
Sail, in which a household oscillating fan blows back and forth, causing a
thin blue sheet hanging and counterweighted from the ceiling to ripple back and
forth like a wave. Clearly, unlike the Movie-Drome, Blue Sail was never meant
to be used for a real-world purpose, it was only meant to enjoy. So what constitutes tech, or even tributes to
tech, is difficult to say. It’s a
general definition of the term that allows any kinetic artwork with a
battery-powered fan as one of its components to be classified as a comment on
the current state of technology. Still,
many of the pieces on display are truly impressive and simply fun to look at,
like many of the New Museum’s permanent installations. The museum is interested in new art, and much
of new art is inspired by technology, since much of the present century is
inspired by technology. This exhibit is
just more specific than most.
And
specificity is one great part of the exhibit, which focuses on (but doesn’t
strictly include) machines that can pinpoint the end result of their programs
within minutes. Ghosts gets right to the point, explaining the What, When, Where,
Why, and How in terms of how the piece applies (however loosely) to the museum’s
point—that man’s quest to bring himself ever closer to the machine will never
end. The exhibition’s online description
claims that Ghosts “brings together
an array of artworks and non-art objects” to achieve its goal. The New Museum, like me and other visitors,
understands that not all of its pieces on display here apply to one ideology. But it also understands that in order to make
a statement, art from every side of the question on hand is required. Here the artists, the curator, and the museum
make their statement loud and clear.
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