Space Odyssey - by David Jager. Published in NOW Toronto
Rating: NNNN (highly recommended)
“Space Invaders” at 1313 Gallery, Toronto.
Space Invaders a group show’s lyrical riffs
Sixteen international new media and video artists are showcase in “Space Invaders” as part of the annual aluCine Festival. Curated by Hugo Ares. A vein of heartfelt lyricism runs through these works, which deal mostly with mundane daily life, social and domestic boundaries, talk and relationship and the never-ending longing for completion. Tsui Kuang-Yu starts the show off with his deadpan video stunts in which he attempts routine daily tasks that go comically awry and odd physical challenges that reference Shaolin imitation. There’s something poignant about a man gliding mournfully down a city street in a large office chair that makes you want to join him. Mark Southerland and Nobuo Kubota add a humorous take on dialogue in “Slowpokes” a performance of sound poetry slowed down to slurred phonemes as they face each other in a standoff reminiscent of Beckett. “Trace” by Sofian Audry, Miriam Bessette and Jonathan Villeneuve, is especially neat, a hanging arrangement of lights, motion sensors and speakers that record body movements. Each person who enters the room sees the previous viewer, as sort of mechanical memory of social and physical trace. In Ulysses Castellanos’s “History of the Revolution”, a list of all known historical revolts from ancient times to present runs over the last 20 minutes of the Jackie Cahn film –The Protector–, surrounded by an installation of gutter stuffed animals. The piece conveys a depressing sense of futility, though the roll call of rebellions and revolutions is staggering. “Face yo face” by Kika Nicolela, made up of more than 20 subjects’ responses to questions about the nature of Love – overwhelms the rest of the show with its directness and vulnerable humanity. Captured in slow motion, the faces betray an astonishing range of emotion as they struggle with the definition of Love. We are the people in this video and their hopes, disappointments and ruminations about love are our own. Hugo Ares have selected a very impressive quality of New Media and Video Artists.
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