Monday 16th of April Gazira Babelis exhibition [Collateral Damage] opened on the Odyssey Island at the Exhibit A Gallery, in Second Life. It's a retrospective show, but there are also many brand new pieces made for this exhibition.
On the occation of this exhibition (of one of the best SL-artist according to Plurabelle Posthorn), there has been written a long and good article: Gaz', Queen of the Desert by Domenico Quaranta, where you'll find a lot of information, viewpoints of Gaziras art projects and some good links for further reading. You'll find the press release for the exhibition HERE.
Two pieces made for this exhibition are called U are here. They are exactly what my humanist friends asked for a couple of weeks ago: Doc: Now if you could just touch the paintings and travel into their world... sort of a Third Life in Second Life. Here you can touch the sculptures and be transported into it. It's raining in the desert. It's because the umbrella is there. |
From Domenico Quarantas article:
Created on occasion of the exhibition [Collateral Damage], U Are Here (April 2007) consists in two sculptures which violate the pact of trust implicit in the practice of teleporting. Or rather, they represent an overly-literal application of the latter. The sculptures are two simple models on pedestals: the first represents a desert with some archeological ruins, the other a room with a window we can peep into to see what’s inside: a banal-looking office with a clock, a desk and a computer. By clicking on the models we are transported into the setting in question: an arid, apparently infinite desert, or a closed room with no way out. Have we been shrunk or just taken hostage inside a “real” version of the setting represented by the two sculptures?
-excerpt from "Gaz', Queen of the Desert" by Domenico Quaranta
Below, a beautiful creature with blue wings is being deformed by one of Gaziras Avatar on Canvas, a series of three Francis Bacon paintings where the main figure has been replaced by a three-dimensional scripted chair. I always wished my neck was longer.
Below: This is Nudes descending a staircase, also a new piece. Just recently Tasrill Sieyes made an avatar looking like Marcel Duchamps Nude descending a staircase. Gazira lets canvases with nudes fall of the wall and arrange themselves randomly as they fall down the stair. Some of the paintings are SL nudes, and as far as I could see, it looks like Cicciolina has got a Second Life too.
Once a nude is kicked down from the wall, a new one rezzes. It's like a nightmare. Nudes, nudes, nudes. They are deposited and finally disappears, but there will always be new nudes. A never-ending stream of nudes descending staircases.
Cd_grey goo , picture above. Gaziras black full bright hat on a pedestal. Notecard tells you to click on it. You do and the whole gallery is filled with question marks or bananas (the banana created by Andy Warhol for the cover of The Velvet Underground’s first LP) or Super Marios.
In October 2006 a minor apocalypse hit a beach in Second Life, burying it under a flood of skipping Super Marios. In technical jargon this is called “grey goo”, an expression used in nanotechnology and science fiction to describe a hypothetical apocalyptic scenario in which self-replicating robots consume all living matter on the earth. Although the cataclysm did generate a certain level of anxiety, Gazira appears to be more interested in setting off a mental short circuit than a genuine system collapse. This was why she populated the three-dimensional, baroque world of Second Life with the definitive icon of the 8-bit era.The exhibition is loaded with art and pop cultural references. Gazira is working very much with appropriations. Quaranta's article is also full of references. Namedropping? (I had my head cut of once for namedropping. I'm still a litle sore. ) Whether it could be called namedropping in this case I can't tell for sure. If it is, is it bad? Well, I love all the reference stuff in Gaziras work. It's fun, humorous, raw.
-excerpt from "Gaz', Queen of the Desert" by Domenico Quaranta
Here comes a piece also using Andy Warhols art with a special Second Life twist to it...
The "Don't say: New Media" piece...
A black cloud with form of a drop or is it a quotation mark on the floor. Hoovering text: Dont say: new media. Of couse you say: new media. Everybody say new media, new media, they write new media, say new media. I never say new media. How does it feel to say new media?
You: new media
: Plurabelle Posthorn.. Don't Say NEW MEDIA!
: Plurabelle Posthorn.. Say Sorry
: Plurabelle Posthorn.. Say Sorry!
: Plurabelle Posthorn.. Say Sorry!
You: Sorry!
(I'm never going to say it again. Exception: I'll say it to Gaziras "Don't say: New Media" piece...)
Now, this exhibition is full of adventure and lots of inspiration for other SL artists I would think. Many of Gaziras scripts can be found on her website free for us to try out in our own art experiments. Just some word about: |
Come Together (April 2007). If you click on one of the pose balls you will start to dance or make other movements up on the pedestal. Hopefully someone will join you and you will get very intimate, even luckier you may experience a treesome, fivesome. No, of course this is not about sex, it's about sculpture. You have to make the sculpture yourself, like in the Avatar on canvas, you are becoming art or a part of Gaziras art work. Come Together for a random composite sculpture. There will be no art without you. (Could also be a reference for the SL group tool called Come Together...) |
Some avatars are developing their physical relationship on other terms, like Wirxli here and his adoptive avatar daughter Fwwixli. |
2 comments:
wow! you are always so in-depth with your articles... they always make me want to visit the places you've been to :]
:) Someone should pay me for it...
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