Art in NYC: Easypieces by Mika Rottenberg at the New Museum
A solo museum presentation of the surrealist videos and wall installations by a contemporary artist Mika Rottenberg. The exhibition features a world premiere of Spaghetti Blockchain (2019), NoNoseKnows (2015), and other artworks; on view from June 25 – Sept. 15, 2019
Opened in 1977, the New Museum is fully dedicated to exhibiting the works of contemporary art by the living artists. This summer its exhibition galleries are featuring a diverse sample of art coming from various parts of the world. One of the museum’s floors shows videos and wall installations by New York-based, Argentinian-Israeli artist Mika Rottenberg entitle Easypieces.
Taking its title from the Six Easy Pieces, a book by theoretical physicist Richard Feynman, the art on view goes from simple observation of repetitive tasks and bizarre mechanical imitations of innocuous movements to video installations that chain together distant geographical places, exotic sounds, and a visual manifestation of a physiological reaction. In her latest work under a catchy name Spaghetti Blockchain (2019), Rottenberg easily mixes Tuvan throat singing from Siberia with the visuals from the CERN Anti-matter Lab, and the process of potato-farming in Maine. Its a kaleidoscope of forms, colors, and sounds employed in an impossible attempt to explain and control the uncontrollable.
Her earlier work NoNoseKnows, which premiered at the Venice Biennale in 2015 takes the viewers to a slave-labor-like factory in China where freshwater pearls are manufactured by infecting the life oysters with an irritant. The frames of the arduous work done by women are mixed with the close observation of sneezing from an allergic reaction to a pollutant. Its grotesque and repulsive while at the same time extremely depressing. Yet the process goes on, and on, and on, – exaggerating the absurdity of the modern globalized manufacturing practices.
Come with an open mind and a guest for curiosity.
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Born in 1976 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Mika Rottenberg grew up in Israel. In 2000 she moved to New York to continue her studies in art. She graduated with a BA from the School of Visual Arts and in 2004 completed an MFA from Columbia University. The artwork by Rottenberg is presented in the major museums and public collections including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Brooklyn Museum, National Gallery of Canada, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston and Tel Aviv Museum of Art and Rose Art Museum.
The art selected for the Easypieces exhibition at the New Museum focuses on questioning the artificial uniformity of daily life brought on by the globalization as shown in Cosmic Generator (2017), the tenuous roles that women are placed in by the division of labor as depicted in NoNoseKnows (2015), or the disappearing mark left by humanity like an echo in the endless Tuvan steppe in Spaghetti Blockchain (2019). The aim of the exhibition is to cause discomfort through closeups of bodily reactions like sneezing juxtaposed against the production process for harvesting the freshwater pearls which involves the use of an irritant. The artist questions the labor practices commonly accepted or intentionally left in the shadows by the modern society. High-minded thinking about the anti-matter and cosmic forces gets meshed with the guttural sounds of throat singing which are carried away across the steppes to the mountain ridges. In the end, a ghostly sound in an eerie landscape is the only thing left. The feeling of suffocation in a room full of brightly-colored plastic stuff makes one gasp for air. This discomfort only intensifies when the kaleidoscope of images pickups the speed.
Funky and highly realistic, the wall installations presented in the central hall make an accurate and odd imitation of ordinary objects. Innocuous things like a whipping ponytail or the spooky finger with a bright-colored fingernail protruding from a wall, compliment the videos. At the same time, these pieces are a respite from the loaded topics covered by the videos. Mundane acts of water drip on a hot skillet making a sizzling sound or condensed water drops from the wall AC collected by a house plant fit well with the exhibition title Easypieces.
The FT review notes “Surrealism’s power to knock the viewer off balance, without holding out an explanatory hand.” Pose, think, and contemplate the complicity of humanity in altering the earth with mundane practices and everyday objects.
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Dates: June 25 – September 15, 2019
Venue: New Museum, 235 Bowery, New York, NY 10002
