 N.I.C.J.O.B: "Breaker", video still, 2002 Josh Müller "Explosive detection system" (Sculpture) N.I.C.J.O.B. "Breaker" (Video) "Explosive Detection System", a full scale replica of a baggage x-ray machine, is a return to the archetypal airport of Josh Müller's 2000 series "Les Constructions du Ciel". Unlike the miniaturized gangways and terminals in that series, however, "Explosive Detection System" focuses on an apparatus often seen but rarely scrutinized, investing it with an existential weight that's almost human. Indeed, "Explosive Detection System" is not so much a replica as it is a portrait in sculpture. Faithful in every external detail, the interior of the sculpture is nonetheless empty and non-functional, fore-grounding the physicality of something originally designed without regard to its appearance. As in a human portrait, Müller's sculpture turns an agent into an object, deflecting the significance of the x-ray machine away from how it sees and onto how it looks. With its masses of rectangular volumes commanding the center of the gallery, "Explosive Detection System" represents a powerful vision of maximal minimalism. N.I.C.J.O.B. (Nicolas Jasmin) does just the opposite with "Breaker". By digitally looping a break-dancer into a never-ending head spin, he defies that dancer's physicality, rendering him unaccountable to forces like gravity and fatigue. The man simply becomes a machine, his perpetual motion inseparable from that of the electrical equipment playing it back. The hip-hop subject is an apt one for N.I.C.J.O.B., whose appropriation and re-mixing of existing footage places him firmly in the "scratch video" tradition. "Scratch video" is a relatively recent development in video art, and its practitioners take their inspiration from the sampled, cut and looped approach pioneered by hip-hop and techno deejays. And in keeping with the spirit of these musical genres, the rhythm of "Breaker" is a celebration of movement. In time, though, the impression shifts. As its repetition gives way to a meditative state, its lone figure begins to recall a yogi mastering a particularly difficult pose. Müller and N.I.C.J.O.B. are both re-construction workers, painstakingly building new realities from existing fragments. Ausstellungsdauer: 17.1. - 16.2.2003 Gallery hours: Thursday – Monday, 12 – 6 pm or by appointment Priska C. Juschka Fine Art 97 North 9th Street, (between Berry Street & Wythe Ave.) Brooklyn, NY 11211, USA T: 00718 782 4100 F: 718 782 4800 E: gallery@priskajuschkafineart.com www.priskajuschkafineart.com |
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