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Past Exhibition
Spandau Parks
Exhibition Dates: June 9–July 21, 2007
The Box gallery opened on June 9, 2007 with an inaugural installation by Spandau Parks.
This installation is a project that began on the evening of June 9th with four projections, three onto the walls of the gallery and one out the front window onto the building across the street. The video projections are moving images that closely examine a painting triptych Spandau began in 1975. It was decided by the artist and the gallery that the piece would not be publicly announced but would run every Thursday, Friday and Saturday night through July 21st. The work was only visible by those who happen to pass by, this included those who live and work in the neighborhood and occasional visitors to the arts scene surrounding the gallery.
Spandau uses the gallery space as a working space, allowing him to change and develop the project throughout the course of the exhibition; the exhibition is art in flux. One of the changes that Spandau made was to project a video he made on June 9th of the video installation. This video includes people inside and outside the gallery, which create shadows and reflections throughout the space. The video is a video, of a video installation, of a painting triptych come alive through movement on structure walls.
Along with the videos, the artist began photographing the video installation; there are now over 1,000 images. He began printing the photographs of the video installation and placing on the walls of the rear gallery, out of public view. By placing still images of a three-dimensional video installation, Spandau has brought the work back to its original two-dimensional form.
On July 19th, the gallery hosted a PUBLIC Closing Reception. What was seen at the closing event on July 19th, was a piece that began on June 9th and continued to develop into an amazingly complex and cyclical group of pieces that has yet to be seen in its entirety by the public.
Spandau Parks. Painting. What is it? An idea, 30 years of work.
A layer. To add layers, builds the ideas. They become multidimensional, the layers begin to reflect on one another. The paint builds on the paint, the abstract builds on the abstract, the image builds on the image, and thus the ideas build on one another. Then on top of the paint another layer is added, first photography, then films. A digital image, the paint is transformed into a digital image; the digital layers build on the paint layers. There is no longer just paint on the canvas, it has transformed. The abstract painting becomes digital imagery.
The light of the projectors changes the shadows created in the crevices of the painting, the shadows shift within the film, becoming more or less extreme, the physicality of the painting is transformed. The corners and crevices of the walls further distort and change the imagery of the painting, taking the flat object and turning it into a multi-faceted, multi-dimensional experience.
When the painting is transferred onto film, the light enables the imagery to multiply and the layers of the paint, again begin to build upon one another. This video installation is a means of taking the traditional art form of painting into a layered, digital language. It is no longer just paint on a canvas, it is imagery lit onto a wall, glass and structure creating a piece that interacts with itself and the viewer.
-Mara McCarthy