Magnus Sigurdarson & Paul Stoppi - Operation Beefeater

BEEFEATER I, 2010, C/print, 27,5” x 27,5”. © Paul Stoppi & Magnus Sigurdarson. Courtesy Pan American Art Projects.

Pan American Art Projects - Miami

La possibilité de vivre commence dans le regard de l’autre.

Houellebecq

By Janet Batet

We should start off by admitting that the old identity-alterity controversy is merely an eccentric illusion opportunely adopted in the past by post-colonial nationalistic politics, in which the individual was labeled as an integral part of a geographically localizable group, to which was attributed specific cultural and historic-social baggage.

Having crossed the threshold of the autocratic modern era, the distinct archtype becomes confusing. The self -that emphatic, arrogant self-awareness- begins to fade. That chameleonlike talisman of polymorphous physiognomy -only acceptable today as a changeable quality- splits into countless avatars that coexist in our personal repertoire, whose garde-robe is as varied as our own personal life experience. Let it be understood as the sum of experiences that constructs our epitome in that errant journey that is human existence in “liquid modernity.”

Magnus Sigurdarson’s oeuvre is located precisely in that interval where the self and the other become ambiguous counterparts, fluctuating entelechies that coexist in the individual: an expression of that self that also contains its alter ego.

Sigurdarson was born in Reykjavik, Iceland in 1966. After disparate journeys that took him from Florence to New Jersey, among others, the artist established residence in Miami.

His artistic offering is a kind of neo-baroque skirmish. If the baroque impulse is indeed indissolubly linked to the romantic spirit, where the grandiloquent self prevails, the neo-baroque makes greater use of the faux pas, the transvestite desire and the stunt. The self and the other become ambiguous in the midst of a shifting terrain where the masquerade and the pose become laudable skills of our everyday existence.

BEEFEATER VIII, 2010, C/print, 26,7” x 40”. © Paul Stoppi & Magnus Sigurdarson. Courtesy Pan American Art Projects.

Where then should we seek referents? How can we decipher -without fear of being mistaken- who is the self and who is the other? In the delicate axis that traces the flow describing those comings and goings, which mark the rhythm between the self and the other, the self is only attainable in the other and vice versa. The only stable characteristic that typifies them is their constant mutation, each confronting Cronus as the only equalizer.

In Operation Beefeater Of Man and his Nature, the artist relies on one of the most immovable archetypes of the long-established British aristocracy: The Yeomen of The Guard, more commonly known as Beefeaters, once a  symbol of the bond between the British throne and military power, ardent guardians of nobility. This unscathed icon is revisited by Sigurdarson in order to -from a satirical point of view- make us aware of the changing nature that typifies the phenomenon of identity. The personage, outside of its context, is  exposed to everyday situations that substantivize the ridiculous, highlighting the problem of displacement as one of the basic pivotal points around which the game of contemporaneity is played. The train game, which accentuates the coexistence of disparate times and at the same time introduces velocity as a current aspect of identity, is fundamental. In others, semantic permutation leads us to an anthropophagic replay not devoid of humor.

The personage of the Beefeater is embodied by the artist himself, whose autobiographical work always addresses the self taken out of context. Perhaps for that reason, Sigurdarson enjoys the reciprocity and the joint venture, as is the case with the current show where he works hand in hand with Paul Stoppi.

The collaboration with Stoppi dates back to 2007, when both artists worked on the joint project, the photographic series I am The Stranger: El Vikingo, Loss of an Identity in which a Nordic figure enters into dialogue with the tropical coast, which at times appears to accept him, only to throw him back seconds later. The series, with obvious references to Camus’ The Stranger, partakes of a tone at once existential and stoic. The toying with the  identity-alterity counterparts is once again the inquisitive subtext that inspires this photographic series, which has been splendidly assembled by Stoppi.

Contained Archipelago - storm I, II & III, 2010, 3 pedestals, (16 ¾” x 16 ¾” x 48”), 3 plexiglas tops (16 ¾” x 16 ¾” x 22”), 3 industrial fans, Styrofoam balls and 500 pounds of rock salt. © Paul Stoppi & Magnus Sigurdarson. Courtesy Pan American Art Projects.

In 2001, Sigurdarson realized Storm. The installation of minimalist force also toyed with these two disparate poles of identity that coexist in the artist. The space appears to be full of what, at first glance, appears to be snow, but which is paradoxically salt and polyethylene crystals. Three large industrial fans fuel the storm. This replay of spatial coordinates where the interior space is supplanted by the exterior and where the fan as an icon of heat coexists with the snow that is actually salt, produces a poetry of bewilderment that, in my opinion, comprises the artist’s most accomplished representation, as well as a beautiful homage to the displaced person proprosed by Todorov.

Another element that subtly appears within Sigurdarson’s characteristic narrative is that of relationships of power. In his video I’m So Much Better than You (2005), the artist appropriates the Chinese puppet theater. Sigurdarson’s head is captured in an extreme close-up that fills the whole stage, while at the same time he is restrained and constricted, forcing him to coexist with two Chinese puppets who assault him the entire time. The discourse here, as in Beefeater, overlays the personal experience angle with repetitive political lecturing on hegemonic power structures, necessitating strategies of cultural dissidence and cimarronage as a last resort.

In this sense, role playing and copyright displacement also become essential - two elements that are key pillars in Sigurdarson and Stoppi’s work. The anonymous personage in each artist is elevated to the role of protagonist. Insubstantial personal history is substantivized, thereby returning to the anonymous person the dignity that has been taken away from him in the daily current, where his insignificant personal history is diluted in the midst of the collective torrent.

Ambiguity and humor are converted into a strategy and talisman. Already liberated from the suffocating cultural weight implied by dictatorial membership in a monolithic culture, where even outside of our countries of origin we participate as ambassadors before the world, we can -at long last- breathe a sigh of relief. From there, the liberating and by no means free gesture of the bodyguard of the British monarchy who, outside of all the austerity that his role demands, pokes around in his orifices until he gives in fascinated by his own viscous secretion, which he later curiously investigates - that jewel of the crown.

What distinguishes us and shapes us is, without a doubt, the sum of juxtaposed experiences that prefigure a polyhedral identity in which the self and the other play each other in the flesh. So, what about the other? What role do we give to this annoying personage, who always appears suspicious, distrustful and arrogant? Alterity or otherness is that image in the mirror. Its presence rescues us from the void, being the only shelter for the self, whose self-awareness appears only under the watchful eye of the other. Magnus Sigurdarson is aware of this; that is why dialogue is always at the core of his coherent fictional narrative, which is nothing more than the stereotype of self, desperately reclaiming its existence in the other.

(February 14 - March 11, 2010)

Janet Batet: Independent curator, art critic and essayist.

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