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Plural

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Workman 1

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Mackenzie

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Review

Joel Herman is an artist based in Toronto

Near the door of Shane Krepakevich’s exhibition _Lightweight_ at Zalucky Contemporary hangs a very slight sculptural gesture. On the ceiling of the gallery is installed a small brass ball from which a long black cord extends downwards. At the end of the cord, nearly touching the floor, is a matching brass ball. The weight of the second ball holds the cord vertical. The set-up calls to mind a plumb line, an instrument used in building to ensure that constructions are vertical. The weight of the plumb bob, or plummet, used in a plumb line will slowly sway back and forth on its cord until it stops, indicating the centre of gravity, or a true vertical reference. A plumb line is multi-directional: it indicates the vertical axis by which buildings are constructed upwards, but similar tools were also used to measure the depths of the ocean. An instrument such as this marks a line that theoretically stretches to the earth’s centre of gravity (the nadir) and upwards infinitely into space (the zenith). It can be said, then, that one of the brass balls in Krepakevich’s construction, as far as Cartesian space is concerned, is directly above – or below – the other. The cord marks a vector aligned with gravity.

Slight as this seems, if we are to take it as an introductory mark, a key by which we can approach other works in the show, it establishes a vocabulary, both materially and theoretically, through which we can understand Krepakevich’s other installations in the gallery space. If what we are seeing is a system, such as a grammar, the materials and effect of gravity upon them in this first construction, establish a set of terms that are then elaborated upon in other works.

_Through path, weight, variance in weight, rhythm, and proportion, lines suggest distance, area, a pause, a tangle, a length of time. A line might move straight from one point to another, wander as much as possible within the course of its path, or cross over itself within a tightly bound space._

_The qualities of a line may be static, or they may vary. Whatever the extent of variation, the ends of a line bear the prospect of its form, suggesting further extension and elaboration._

The above lines were taken from a text written by Krepakevich titled _Between Two Things_. The text calls to mind the opening of Paul Klee’s _Pedagogical Sketchbook_ (1925), where Klee describes “\[a\]n active line on a walk, moving freely, without goal. A walk for a walk’s sake. The mobility agent, is a point, shifting its position forward.” The artistic temperament from the time of Klee’s words is very much in evidence in Krepakevich’s exhibition, as the works deploy a vocabulary reminiscent of the Russian avant-garde of the 1920s. The compositions, as well as the collapsing of art and design (Krepakevich is also a designer who produces lighting fixtures and furniture), recall the efforts of Suprematism and Constructivism.

On the back wall of the gallery is installed another work, and here we see the same vocabulary of materials: brass and black cord. This time, however, the cord is suspended on a horizontal axis. A small brass fixture on the left protrudes slightly from the wall, and following the cord the eye stops at another brass fixture – this one larger and affixed to the wall at an oblique angle – where the cord stops. Hung as if on a clothesline is a single photograph, and the weight of this photograph pulls the cord into a gentle downward arch. In another installation, the cord emerges from two points on a bulkhead near the gallery’s ceiling, and suspends a brass tube horizontally. Over it hangs a piece of foil, as well as two brass hooks holding photographs. Seen one way, the installations act like display structures, or elaborate framing devices, for the photographic images. Krepakevich has also painted the walls where these works are installed, bracketing them and further suggesting a sort of mise-en-scène.

Cinema also populates Krepakevich’s installations in _Lightweight_. The photographs that inhabit these installations are stills from films such as _In the Mood for Love, The Hustler_ and _The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant_. All show interior spaces. Krepakevich introduces a remove from these images by photographing them off a computer screen in his studio, allowing the reflections of overhead lights to obscure parts of the images. This functions as a means of reinforcing the surface of the image, but also introduces one interior over another: the artist’s studio over that of the filmic representation.

The distinctions between art and design seem to be fluid in Krepakevich’s exhibition. This is not, however, an art exhibition about design. Instead, we see permeability between the two disciplines, but what one is saying to the other isn’t clear. What does it mean for brass and black cord to be used in a lamp, and for those same materials to be used in a (non-functional) art object, made by the same individual? Is what we are seeing a conflation of art and design of the order endorsed in the 1920s? As an art historical reference point, we visually understand the types of abstract geometries of this period. What is perhaps less legible is the political and social milieu from which these geometries arose – a time of war, turmoil and revolution. But of course today we have our own wars, and our own turmoil. How do these echoes from the 1920s reflect our present circumstances? If these echoes are part of a modernity that T.J. Clark describes as “a social order which has turned from the worship of ancestors and past authorities to the pursuit of a projected future,” perhaps they are a means of bypassing present circumstances altogether. If the art of the past looked to the future, it would seem that the art of the present is increasingly concerned with looking to the past. For Krepakevich this seems to be a matter of engaging with historical formal experiments. Gravity, weight, line, surface, angles. His works are not effusive statements, but delicate constructions that demand close scrutiny.

Writer

Performance

issue-130-p65-67.pdf

This article reviews Shane Krepakevich’s exhibition Lightweight at Zalucky Contemporary in Toronto, presented from Feb.20 – March 19, 2016.

Shane Krepakevich: Lightweight

One of the best views of Aleksandra Domanović’s show _Mother of This Domain_, while it was featured at Plug In ICA, in Winnipeg, wasn’t from the inside of the gallery. On pitch-black winter afternoons, accidental passersby could experience the piece _Things to Come_ (2014) curiously spilling out of big glass windows on the east side of the exhibition space. From the sidewalk, a set of futuristic images printed onto thin sheets of polyester foil seemed ghostly, and appeared to be violating the familiar physicality of space. Inside, the installation gained some materiality. Hung from the ceiling, about 40 inches apart, soft transparent panels completely filled the room, and allowed just enough space for visitors to walk in between them, and get disoriented by the strange environment. Despite being presented in familiar formats – namely, as installations, sculptures, and video – all five works featured in Domanović’s show possess an uncanny digital dimension, allowing for unexpected connections between facts, probabilities and improbabilities, and generating a rich hypertextual interplay of perspectives.

Named after a 1936 sci-fi film written by H.G. Wells, _Things To Come_ features carefully selected allusions to significant portrayals of women and technology in popular science fiction. One such allusion reproduces an image of the MedPod – a device for automated, generalized surgical procedures that the patient himself operates – from Ridley Scott’s 2012 _Prometheus_. And I do mean _himself_, for when the female protagonist tries to perform a life-saving caesarean on herself, the interface informs her that the machine has been programmed for male bodies only. In Domanović’s work, this notorious enmity between human and machine in sci-fi is rewired back to socio-cultural reality, and exposed largely as a gender tension. This makes sense, considering that not only are most sci-fi films directed by men but most devices are also indeed programmed by men. This tension reaches a culmination in a superimposed detail from the MedPod image, which places a woman quite bluntly in the role of a technological extension, and comes, alarmingly, from a real-life historical document. Sticking out of a slot in the MedPod, as if from a giant typewriter, a copy of a 1938 rejection letter, typed on letterhead adorned with Snow White imagery, confronts the viewer. This letter from Walt Disney Productions advises an aspiring animator, Miss Mary V. Ford, that “women do not do any of the creative work in connection with preparing the cartoons for the screen as that work is performed entirely by young men.” Apparently, the only acceptable work for women consists of tracing the lines and colouring in, “according to directions.” This precious information-fossil resonatingly conveys the often-neglected aspects of modern knowledge production. Throughout modern history, and still today, women in the technological realm are widely abased to positions of automatic labour, commonly associated with robots. In fact, the word “robot” derives from the Slavic “rob,” meaning slave, and “robota,” meaning forced labour. At this point, the MedPod as typewriter – a technology that introduced women as extensions into the male-only business environment – sends a far-reaching intertextual message.

Aleksandra Domanović was born in the former Yugoslavia, the federation of countries best known for its largely popular form of communism, and brutal wars following the decline of the political system in the ’90s. I was born in Yugoslavia myself, and can confirm that this largely androcentric metanarrative is pretty much all that ended up in history textbooks. In the documentary video _From yu to me_ (2013–2014), Domanović again digs up unexplored archival rarities, this time in connection with the little known establishment of Yugoslavia’s first Internet domain: .yu. Slovenia – the country where the domain was registered – exited the communist party just a few months later, and claimed state independence, precipitating the federation’s breakup. The mother of this domain, honoured in the exhibition title, is Borka Jerman Blažič, who along with another female computer scientist, Mirjana Tasić, was one of the administrators of the domain. Blažič later explained that the domain had to be set up virtually, guerrilla-style, as she was “fighting a war” with the political establishment. Yugoslavian officials were strongly in favour of setting the Internet server either in Belgrade, the federation’s political centre, or in its geographic center, Sarajevo. After the breakup of Yugoslavia, the .yu domain lived a turbulent and politically charged life all the way until 2010, when it became the most heavily used top-level domain ever to be deleted. Contrary to common belief, Domanović shows again and again how the web was never a medium detached from systemic corporate and political realms. Furthermore, within such a mass of information created interactively, there are no trivial items. Highly personalized, culturally and contextually specific information constantly resists the standardizing process of so-called globalization.

This theme is restated in Domanović’s _The Future Was at Her Fingertips_ (2013–ongoing), a simple document in the style of museum captions that presents a personalized timeline of locally consequential events and underrepresented turning points in the history of technology. For instance: “1843: Ada Lovelace writes what is considered to be the first computer program,” and “1963: Rajko Tomović develops one of the earliest artificial limbs with a sense of touch known as the ‘Belgrade Hand’.” Domanović often recontextualizes disregarded information with an aim to revive and preserve._Untitled_ (30.111.2010), is a monument to the terminated .yu domain. The relics of the domain’s online life are printed on the sides of tall stacks of office paper, forming embellished cuboidal columns. Appropriately, the piece is available in a downloadable digital file, so that anyone with an ordinary office printer, and a willingness to tinker with the settings, can create their own copies.

During an event in which she was invited to respond to Domanović’s exhibition, artist and academic T.L. Cowan – or rather, her performative alter-ego, Mrs. Trixie Cane – ironically quipped about the _Untitled (30.III.2010)_ that women have finally learned how to use a printer. On a deeper level, however, she was right. By resetting the printer, Domanović manages to use its program in a highly improbable way, subverting the most expected, automatic outcomes embedded in the machine. I can’t think of a better way to resist the increasing tendency towards the standardization and automation of human creativity and knowledge production.

_Mother of This Domain_ was also exhibited at Oakville Galleries at Centennial Square, Oakville March 20 – May 29, 2016

issue-130-p62-64.pdf

This article reviews Aleksandra Domanovic’s exhibition Mother of this Domain at Plug In Institute of Contemporary Art in Winnipeg, presented from Sept. 26, 2015- Jan.3, 2016.

Aleksandra Domanović: Mother of This Domain

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