dayoutlast is a record of my direct engagement with mostly contemporary art, mostly Los Angelean.

As this blog has evolved since its 2010 inception, so has my perspective. What I once perceived as central within the investigation was what was central, literally, within the photographic frame that I shared here. While still an important consideration, such thinking has also given way to more peripheral considerations, ones also accompanied occasionally by text (written manifestation of thought) and the oscillations between them. What's missing here are larger unknowns surrounding issues of presentation and representation; the amount of time and space it actually takes to accomplish such first-hand observations; and the quandaries between documentation and interpretation.

Despite my attempt to communicate here with image and text what is essential in some respect about the artwork, neither representation should ever be considered a substitution for the primary viewing experience. Of course, occasionally there are exceptions.

Most of the time, these posts are merely remnants---residual fragments---from my last day out.

Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Michal Rovner "Nofim" @ Shoshana Wayne


Current Cross, 2014
Video Projection
Dimensions Variable





Broshei Laila, 2012
Black limestone and video projection
3'-3/8" x 11'-13/16" x 3"



Divided,  2014
LCD Screens, paper, and video
46 1/2" x 40 1/2" x 2 3/8"


(Divided, cropped at frame edges)

Yet another video installation with interesting setups (layered projections, projection on stone, paired flat screens).  In my primary viewing, I thought about scale in the first, the second monumentality, and the third division.  And, on this particular viewing day, I was also thinking about light, materials, and time in relation to Animal Charm (see here) and Anya Galaccio (see here) both of which I had viewed just before.

Despite making some thoughtful connections (light, time, scale, movement, surface), something kept me from, ultimately, liking the show, something in the aesthetic, I'm sure.  Despite it's proposed levity, I also think it took itself too seriously, and therefore read a little too tight for my liking.  When considering the artist's conceptual concerns in terms of time and place (she is from Tel Aviv and is now still a part-time resident of Israel), one can perhaps feel the agony of this work, particularly if one were to consider recent political events in the area not to mention a larger historical narrative of such division in place.  So, then taking into account artist persona and intent, the work still seems conflicted between a global, big picture perspective, and smaller fragments. I prefer the latter, because not only does the image then become more abstract, but it also all encompassing in its inclusion of smaller, concrete elements thereby actually containing a whole in the smallest of divided details, again a fragment. While these issues (the formal/conceptual ones) are clearly not black and white but varying tones along a continuum, this much I can view and appreciate about Rovner's work. I still wonder where she stands on this spectrum, at least between dark and light.




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