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Techno for an answer >> A shortlist of technology-related exhibits by KEITH MARCHAND
Touch:Touché Oboro gallery presents electronic sculpture by two Vancouver-based artists, Thecla Schiphorst and Daniel Jolliffe, whose works investigate and challenge prevailing views on interactivity. In Jolliffe's piece entitled Room for Walking, the viewer finds a child's wagon in the middle of the gallery. Only the metal cladding and lens protruding from the top panel suggest that this might be more than a kid's toy. However, it is only by pulling the wagon through the gallery like a four-year-old that the piece is activated. As the handle is lifted and the little rolling sculpture is towed along, images are cast up onto the ceiling of the gallery. These images are, in turn, picked up in the mirrored top panel of the wagon. As the handle is used to change the buggy's direction, a landscape appears: violets, buttercups, flagstones and turf. Only by navigating the whole space can the entire series of images emerge. Thecla Schiphorst's Bodymaps: artifacts of touch is housed in a dark room containing a table covered in white velvet. This multimedia installation may also only be activated by a touch-sensitive pallet. Images of a female character (the artist), wind-rattled trees, water, fabric and human hands are accompanied by an evocative soundscape. When the viewer stops touching the highly responsive surface, the action stops. The continuity of both sound and image are controlled by the viewer. The intention of Touch:Touché is to actively engage the visitor in exploring the physical and psychological politics surrounding technology and the human touch. Machine in the Garden Featuring paintings by Kevin Willson and "excavations" by Yechel Gagnon, this inaugural exhibition by brand new gallery, The Green Room, is concerned with exploring the role of the mechanical in art. Willson's paintings probe the pervasive elements of speed, repetition and sensory bombardment in late 20th-century society. He takes inspiration from pop culture and the suburban experience. His heavily patterned canvases repeat images causing the same erosion of meaning seen in 1960's Pop Art. Working on sheets of plywood, Gagnon uses chisel, router, blowtorch and swatches of material to create fascinating topographies. Reminiscent of the work of Patterson Ewen (being both sculptural and archaeological), her canvases are industrial bas-reliefs. Machine in the Garden refers to the often difficult relationship between the natural and the mechanical. dé/finition des sites This show features a series of large canvases by Belgian artist Bernard Gilbert. Stapled to the walls of Observatoire 4 are works that seem to defy categorization as paintings, photographs or enormous computer-generated images. The artist claims to be attempting a new visual language that properly reflects the presence of technology in our society. His works, referred to as "sites," are large surfaces of polyester material that are striated using acrylics. The effects is dizzying and the meanings of these strange test-patterns are open-ended. Gilbert investigates technology as pure aesthetic using some of the trappings of OpArt. Touch:Touché at Oboro to April 3, 4001 Berri, #301. Machine in the Garden at The Green Room to March 31, 372 Ste-Catherine W., #526. dé/finition des sites at Observatoire 4 to March 27, 372 Ste-Catherine W., #426
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As humanity teeters and lurches toward the new millennium like a drunkard on roller skates, we feel increasingly inclined to examine our position in the big cosmic goulash. Three current exhibitions question humankind's relationship to technology and the ensuing residue of this post-industrial society.