Early for Ai Weiwei, but in good time for Cardiff/Miller and Evan Penny

We’ll be back when the Ai Wei Wei show opens at the Art Gallery of Ontario (after August 17) but today was ideal for experiencing the sound-stage-props-environments called into existence by the collaboration of artists Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller.
I can’t show you pictures of those installations, for very good reasons that I’ll explain after the “Read More”, if you’re interested.
I can show you (sort of) some curious works we found down a back stairway. Above you see a sampling of plasters by Toronto sculptor Evan Penny. I say I can sort of show you because a flat photograph doesn’t really convey the strange illusions these pieces create. They are 3D illusions… apparently very realistic viewed head on but skewed flat from the side. Penny creates anamorphic deformations that we are used to seeing in pictures and renders them as solid objects.
They play with what we think of as realism, on one hand delivering extremely accurate detail while on the other, tricking our eyes with illusion. The plasters are only a stage in the work. Finished pieces are cast in flesh-like silicone and coloured to look more lifelike than figures in a wax museum. [See “Back of Kelly” here]
The “unphotographability” has something in common with the installations of Cardiff and Miller now on display on the AGO’s fourth floor.

Artists in the age of digital reproduction
Pop stars must tour and do concerts now, to connect with real people and real cash. Downloading, easy copying and instant distribution have changed the economics of performance.
Some fine artists have been ahead of the curve on this problem. Old patronage systems broke down in the 20th century. Starving artists. So what to do? If you’re angry about the situation, you might rebel against the products-for-sale business model that has failed you and make art that no one could buy, even if they wanted to. The rejected could do some rejecting of their own. Earthworks, installations, happenings, acts of self-mutilation… these weren’t art objects to be purchased, copied or mass produced. You couldn’t experience such art second hand. As the saying goes, you had to be there.
Hostility to an indifferent society might have been an emotional stimulant for some artists, but it’s not powerful enough to sustain creative output. It’s too negative. Besides, sticking a finger up at society doesn’t get you an income or a place to show your stuff.
But if you make art that has to be physically experienced, in real time and space…
And if you could get that space from an art industry of galleries and museums that already exists…
And if you could feed these places content that drew crowds and made the art business relevant again…
Maybe you’re onto something that will work, even in the digital age.
You had to be there
Even if there weren’t security guards watching to prevent visitors from shooting stills or making videos, people could not capture the work of Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller with their iPhones. Each of the installations was walled up in a room of its own, which we entered through doors that closed behind us.
The first one, called the Dark Pool, reminded me of entering a dark old attic, or perhaps an old junk shop. It was dark inside, with little pools of light here and there, caused by dangling light bulbs. Little tableaus of stuff…old books, a typewriter, notes, tins were revealed under the lights. Motion sensors triggered snippets of dialogue from visible speakers sitting on tables or hanging in the darkness. Little old dusty speakers, scavenged from radios. Big huge speakers flanking a chair to sit in. They triggered a stereo dialogue.
Anyway, enough of that. You have to go there… and see, hear, walk around and feel your way through yourself. That’s the point.
But there’s more to it than that. There’s expression. Each of the various rooms provided completely different experiences and impressions. Feelings.
The Killing Machine was eerie… a 5-minute performance by surreal robots. They hovered over an automaton barber chair covered in fake fur, probing, examining, stinging with their penlight eyes. Ugly sounds. When the 5-minute cycle ends and all falls silent, the next visitor must press a big button to start things off again. Do it and you’re implicated.
There are many more rooms and my poor descriptions barely touch on all there is to experience and discover. See? I can’t even describe the exhibit. It is truly “of our time”, defying all of our digital copying and communicating.
At the same time, the means used by Cardiff and Miller embrace and use technology in every way imaginable, delivering something that our clever, glossy screens just can’t convey.
I didn’t really expect to get much from the Cardiff/Miller experience. I’m delighted to have been so wrong. Do go and get Lost in the Memory Palace.