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The Cinema Effect
Isaac Julien. Installation view of "Fantome Creole", 2005, from the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden's collection. Image courtesy of the artist.
The Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden has included the unprecedented exhibition: “The Cinema Effect: Illusion, Reality and the Moving Image” in this year’s schedule. It is a reflection on how the invention of cinema and its accompanying introduction of the moving image have radically changed the human being’s perception of his surroundings.
The exhibition, conceived by Kerry Brougher, Acting Director and Chief Curator of the Hirshhorn Museum and his team of collaborators, includes film, video installations and digital works produced by a heterogeneous group of artists, comprised of both masters of international renown and emerging creators. The show has been divided into two parts: “Dreams” and “Realisms.” The titles were inspired respectively by the work of cinematographic art pioneers at the end of the 19th Century: George Méliès’ magical films and the Lumiére brothers’ documentaries.
“Dreams,” shown from February 14 through May 11, was a reflection on the incredible ability of movies to transport us to imaginary worlds. This section was personally curated by Kerry Brougher with the assistance of Associate Curator, Kelly Gordon. The exhibition opened with an enormous curtain, similar to those used in the movie houses of yesteryear, as a kind of prelude to “the dream factory,” courtesy of the artist, Douglas Gordon. “Dreams” was conceived as a kind of 3-D dream in which the visitor was able to roam the museum halls, which had been transformed into a labyrinth of cameras, thereby abandoning himself to the enjoyment of the senses, losing all notion of time and space. Among the artists assembled in the first part of the exhibition were: Darren Almond, Chiho Aoshima, Michael Bell-Smith, Bruce Conner, Tacita Dean, Stan Douglas, Harun Farocki, Christoph Girardet, Douglas Gordon, Rodney Graham, Gary Hill, Teresa Hubbard/Alexander Birchler, Anthony McCall, Steve McQueen, Saskia Olde Wolbers, Tony Oursler, Kelly Richardson, Wolfgang Staehle, Siebren Versteeg and Andy Warhol.
Of note in this exhibition was Anthony McCall’s installation, “You and I, Horizontal” (2005). In a darkened space, a beam of white light emerges from a projector. The light opens out into a kind of cone which divides the space. The author toys with the perception of the spectator who can travel the length of the beam of light longitudinally, traverse it or let himself get wrapped up in it, blurring the boundaries between physical and psychological space.
Another work worthy of mention is “Eight” (2001) by Teresa Hubbard and Alexander Bichler. This piece revolves around the construction of a physical and temporal narrative far removed from traditional linear narratives. The camera films the interior and exterior of a house in which a birthday party has taken place; it is nighttime in the midst of a torrential downpour. A girl who has apparently just celebrated her eighth birthday appears indistinctly inside and outside of the residence trying to salvage a piece of cake. The camera films the interior and exterior space continuously until the spectator senses that the space he believed to be the interior of the house is now the rain-drenched patio and vice versa. The scenes appear disconnected from each other and the spectator is free to create infinite narratives in each of the spaces through which the film meanders.
“Realisms,” the second part of “The Cinema Effect,” will open on June 19 and will be shown until September 7. This second part was organized by Curator, Anne Ellegood and Associate Curator, Kristen Hileman. “Realisms” is an ironic look at an era, like the present one, in which, even though documenting real life through cinematographic means is increasingly simple, the line separating reality from fiction is becoming incredibly diffuse.
The show will assemble the work of nineteen artists of international renown, such as: Candice Breitz, Matthew Buckingham, Paul Chan, Ian Charlesworth, Phil Collins, Jeremy Deller, Kota Ezawa, Omer Fast, Pierre Huyghe, Runa Islam, Christian Jankowski, Isaac Julien, Michèle Magema, Julian Rosefeldt, Corinna Schnitt, Mungo Thomson, Kerry Tribe, Francesco Vezzoli and Artur Zmijewski.
“Realisms” will be divided into two segments. The first will focus on works that interpret reality, citing semiotic resources utilized by television and Hollywood productions. Among the pieces to be presented, of note is Julian Rosefeldt’s “Lonely Planet” (2006). It is a piece in which Rosefeldt personifies the Western traveler who seeks adventure in India expecting to find the stereotypical vision of the country as depicted by the entertainment industry.
The second segment of “Realisms” will examine media manipulation of information about people, places and historic events, as well as politics and even justice. Isaac Julien’s “Fantôme Créole” (2005) will be exhibited in this section. This artist displays a work of tremendous historical and critical significance. Through special handling of time and space, Julien reflects on Black identity in a global culture. In “Fantôme Créole” the author questions the traditional posture of the West vis-à-vis politics and history. To this end he metaphorically associates travelers, Michel Leiris, André Gide and Marc Allegret and their expeditions to the African continent, with the figure of the African-American, Matthew Henson, a member of the expedition that reached the North Pole. The work is a reflection on the peculiarities of geopolitical movements from North to South and South to North.
“The Cinema Effect: Illusion, Reality and the Moving Image” is without a doubt an exhibition that will leave a lasting impression on the public because as Kerry Brougher notes, movies are indissolubly linked to contemporary man’s daily reality: “Today, the cinema is everywhere, (…) The cinematic is in the way we perceive the world, in the way we speak, in the way we dream. We have no need to enter a movie theater to escape into an illusory world; life itself is just like a movie.”
