Tuesday, July 2, 2013

How to Butcher a Moose, How to Cut a Film



Currently on display at Catriona Jeffries Gallery is Modest Livelihood, a collaboration between sculptor Brian Jungen and filmmaker Duane Linklater that features three film works, two in the larger gallery (one of which is a double-screen projection), with the eponymous film  projected (as video) in a room of its own.

A lot has been written on Modest Livelihood (2012) since its debut at the Banff Centre last summer, but something lacking in the discussion, at least as far as I can see, is mention of the formal relationship between cutting and editing: how the cutting (up) of a bagged moose is a kind of reverse sculpture for Jungen (not unlike how he cut up Nike trainers and montaged the elements into his formline-friendly northwest coast masks), and how that cutting parallels the cutting (and editing) of film stock -- towards the very film that concludes with that gesture.

Something else worth noting: Modest Livelihood provides further evidence of Jungen's burgeoning interest in primary -- or non-mediated -- "materials", something I took up in a recent review of the artist's exhibition at the Hannover Kunstverein.

No comments:

Post a Comment