Surplus Space

Eight Mile Before

As a curator-in-residence at Surplus, the Environmental Impact Statement collective will take the opportunity to engage the local community with the work of EIS artists and their concerns with land use, threatened wild places, Pacific Northwest aesthetics, and Oregon public land use practices. EIS will hold events throughout the course of the exhibit that engage the public.  These events will include readings of EIS' writers' work, performances, and discussions.   EIS's focus on community and sustainability creates an exciting partnership with Surplus Space's neighborhood base.  To be a good neighbor is to be aware of one’s place in the world.  A good neighbor has an awareness and respect to the shared spaces they inhabit.  Such as, their immediate surroundings where they live, the larger area that exists near by, and radiating outward.  Being a good neighbor is a willingness to knowing where you live, its history, the people, and their stories. EIS acts as a good neighbor by providing space to make our community more aware of the threats to the surrounding wild places in their larger neighborhood, such as the Mt. Hood National Forest.

Eight Mile After

Opening @ Surplus Space

2/28/15 6 -9pm

irl///onlineonly is a group show curated by Katie Holden featuring works by Portland State University's current MFA candidates. In conjunction with showing each artist's work, Holden has approached the artists to be individually interviewed. Through a series of books the cohort voiced their opinions on the effects or non-effects digital life has on their art practices. These interviews act as a preface to a printed archive of their internet postings from the last 3 months. Holden asked the artists to consider the question, "What is real life?" as well as how they feel about the now ubiquitous acronym in relation to exhibiting and sharing their work. Participating MFA candidates: Jea Alford, &&&, Kensey Anderson, Sarah-Jasmine Calvetti, Chris Freeman, Hyunju Kim, Kyle Lee, Emily Lewis, Pam Minty, and Amanda Wilson. 

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Surplus Space is accepting proposals for three guest curators for 2015. Each month of our final year we’re inviting a different guest curator to program Surplus Space. Our hope is that with an open call we’ll receive a diverse selection of proposals to fill our remaining three 2015 slots.  All guest curators will receive a $300 honorarium. 

The application closes March 31st. 

  BECAUSE us girls crave records and books and fanzines that speak to US that WE feel included in and can understand in our own ways.

BECAUSE we wanna make it easier for girls to see/hear each other's work so that we can share strategies and criticize-applaud each other.

BECAUSE we must take over the means of production in order to create our own moanings.

BECAUSE viewing our work as being connected to our girlfriends-politics-real lives is essential if we are gonna figure out how we are doing impacts, reflects, perpetuates, or DISRUPTS the status quo.

BECAUSE we recognize fantasies of Instant Macho Gun Revolution as impractical lies meant to keep us simply dreaming instead of becoming our dreams AND THUS seek to create revolution in our own lives every single day by envisioning and creating alternatives to the bullshit christian capitalist way of doing things.

BECAUSE we want and need to encourage and be encouraged in the face of all our own insecurities, in the face of beergutboyrock that tells us we can't play our instruments, in the face of "authorities" who say our bands/zines/etc are the worst in the US and

BECAUSE we don't wanna assimilate to someone else's (boy) standards of what is or isn't.

BECAUSE we are unwilling to falter under claims that we are reactionary "reverse sexists" AND NOT THE TRUEPUNKROCKSOULCRUSADERS THAT WE KNOW we really are.

BECAUSE we know that life is much more than physical survival and are patently aware that the punk rock "you can do anything" idea is crucial to the coming angry grrrl rock revolution which seeks to save the psychic and cultural lives of girls and women everywhere, according to their own terms, not ours.

BECAUSE we are interested in creating non-heirarchical ways of being AND making music, friends, and scenes based on communication + understanding, instead of competition + good/bad categorizations.

BECAUSE doing/reading/seeing/hearing cool things that validate and challenge us can help us gain the strength and sense of community that we need in order to figure out how bullshit like racism, able-bodieism, ageism, speciesism, classism, thinism, sexism, anti-semitism and heterosexism figures in our own lives.

BECAUSE we see fostering and supporting girl scenes and girl artists of all kinds as integral to this process.

BECAUSE we hate capitalism in all its forms and see our main goal as sharing information and staying alive, instead of making profits of being cool according to traditional standards.

BECAUSE we are angry at a society that tells us Girl = Dumb, Girl = Bad, Girl = Weak.

BECAUSE we are unwilling to let our real and valid anger be diffused and/or turned against us via the internalization of sexism as witnessed in girl/girl jealousism and self defeating girltype behaviors.

BECAUSE I believe with my wholeheartmindbody that girls constitute a revolutionary soul force that can, and will change the world for real.

Split / Frame Niki Korth / Kiki North AGGREGATE SPACE OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA 2014

Niki Korth 2014. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial 4.0 International License. If you reproduce this work, you must include this page. Edited by Steffi Drewes Printed at Aggregate Space, February 2014 8 19

K: I see. So I shall interpret this so-called feather duster as a symbol for consciousness.

N: That’s an interesting logical leap… but don’t you think it’s more –

K: Silence, please. I am content with this interpretation and wish to reflect on it further.

II: IS A NARRATIVE A HOUSE

4 hours later, Niki and Kiki move on to discover a new work – Omer Gal’s Naked Cave (2013; 3 Channel Video Loop, 15:29)

K: I am satisfied with my reflections on the nature of consciousness as represented in the pink feather duster. Let us now move on to the next piece.

N: Very well.

K: There are three screens here – and they are all producing different sounds. How do I know what to look at and what to listen to? Would it be easier if I had the pink feather duster?

N: Well, I don’t think that pink feather dusters have an inherent ability to help a person make decisions about how to distribute their attention span. But if you build some kind of symbolic power into what a feather duster means to you, what powers it harbors – then it might help you. But to answer your question – there’s no right and wrong thing to pay attention to. You should just... I don’t know, relax and see what attracts your interest.

K: Very well. Okay. I see a tent-like structure, which seems to be made of some kind of plastic, perhaps? It is a translucent compound – and I see a human figure costumed to appear like a wolf, a man, a woman, a hooded violinist, a female. Oh, yes, who is this woman?

N: The violinist captures your attention?

K: Yes… this violinist is an especially captivating character. Is she a muse, or a narrator? I cannot tell. She seems to be a character in her own right within the narrative of this piece, but also serves as a guide of sorts, almost like the master of a dream…

N: Yea, the narrative dimension of this piece is really interesting to me too – especially because the videos all play on loops, which intersect at different points depending on when you begin watching. Thus the narrative is like a repetitive and perpetual cycle, which to me seems more in line with the way that life is actually experienced, in contrast to the “closed totality” of most narrative works, particularly those with a clear “beginning” and “end” point (those that one watches in a single sitting).

K: Yes, I believe the violinist is the master of this so-called cyclical narrative.

N: Do you think that all narratives require a master?

K: I did not say that. But I do believe that the violinist is the master of the particular narrative we are discussing. I came across the expression “the one who pulls the strings,” and understand that it refers to the person who controls a particular operation – but somewhat invisibly, or in the background. I relate this idea to this violin player who does not pull the strings as much as she rubs strings against one another, according to a specific system, in order to produce vibrations that produce melodic sounds. But here it is both her sounds and her image that command the story.

N: Yea… And the woman playing the violin, or should I say, the woman playing the woman playing the violin, is also the hooded woman – there, who appears there with the wolf man.

K: She is the one who was feeding the wolf man? Or at least putting those objects that resemble food into his mouth. I remember they appeared as if they were made out of fabric of some sort... Can humans eat fabric? I had assumed that they cannot – and I actually conducted research on wolves recently, so I understand them to be carnivores, and thusly conclude that they do not consume fabric. Or are there some fabrics in fact made of meat?

N: I agree that those meat-like objects are… representations of meat, and are made of fabric. And, no, neither humans nor wolves eat fabric. A fabric made of meat is interesting to imagine… although it would require one to define fabric in a rather loose way. Like, fabric is a material, so to say that a material is made of a different material would sort of make it cease to be that original material, right? Unless you define fabric more as a concept.

K: But I want to return to this violin figure, this hooded woman. Is there a reason why her face is hidden? Does it impact the narrative?

N: Well, of course it impacts the narrative – anytime the identity of a character is obscured, it impacts the narrative that houses them.

K: Houses them – is a narrative like a house? And speaking of houses – is that translucent, tent-like structure in the video a house? Is this where the wolf man and the hooded violinist live when they are not in this bright, white environment we see on the other screens?

N: Is a narrative a house... now that sounds like a provocative title… And, sure, they might live there, if that’s how you want to imagine it. But I can’t really answer your question any further than that. Now you got me thinking about how narrative works in videos and moving images versus how it works in written texts, which I guess I’m always thinking about, and how the licensing of works, which is impacted by the medium they are made in, affects the manner in which these narratives can grow, evolve, be shared…

K: Licensing? What is a license?

N: A license is something that gives permission for some action. The word is both a verb – to license – as well as a noun referring to the document that grants a license –

K: Do I require a license in order to view this video...? You did not inform me of this. Do we need to leave?

N: No, no, don’t worry. There are many types of licenses. What I’m talking about are licenses for the use and distribution of creative works, such as this video.

K: Is “use” defined as the act of viewing? Are we using this video now by watching it?

N: I’m not sure, but I think that viewing falls into the category of distribution. In the sense that we are able to view it because it is being distributed, albeit presently to only one location.

K: So how are permissions for viewing granted within this system? Are the artists allowed to decide who is permitted to enter the gallery and view the work?

N: No… that would be quite strange… it’s more like, and I really don’t know exactly what it would be for video really... with physical artworks, such as paintings and sculptures, there’s not a license involved but rather an agreement to show the work, and usually to release the gallery of liability in the event that the physical artwork is damaged –

K: I see… but with video, the only object in the space is the so-called monitor, which functions as a vehicle for the intangible work – the video. N: A majority of the time, yes. But you’re right – there sort of is no original, at least for digital video like this. I mean, there’s a master copy of some kind, mastered over by someone, which is then used to make more copies, but those copies can also function as new originals (at least in terms of copying DVDs). The master, or original, is needed in order to produce copies of potentially different formats.

K: I believe I understand. But, tell me, what is the relationship between this video and what you say? The connection between the translucent cave, the wolf man, the hooded violinist, and this… problem about the immateriality of video?

N: I’m more talking about the connection between any video work and these questions of immateriality, property, exhibition and use rights…

K: And what is this connection?

N: Well…

K: I do not believe you know yourself. But I sense that it has some relationship to the manner in which the hooded woman seems to be simultaneously entering these food-like objects into the wolf man’s mouth as well as removing them…

N: It does seem related to those fabricated, meat-like objects, and how they exist in two contradictory states in relation to the wolf man.

K: Do they contradict one another? I was under the impression that they were merely opposite.

N: Does what contradict what?

K: The states in which the food-like fabricated objects relate to the wolf man?

N: Oh – yes, I was referring to what you said about how it appears like they are entering and leaving his mouth at the same time. So it’s like he’s consuming them and… having them removed at the same time. And this would be a contradiction: something can’t enter and exit something at the same time.

K: Is this not similar to the “cycle” you were referring to before? To me, this act is not contradictory – if anything, it brings the final order to the work. Not in the sense of resolution of differences and contradictions, but rather in the sense of allowing them to be seen as coexisting, letting them live together. The transparent cave also speaks to this, in that it provides protection from the elements, but keeps everything in plain view.

N: Cycles of coexisting contradictions…? I like that.

K: As do I. And this idea also provides some guidance into how one can approach the multiple sounds and screens in this piece.

N: And what is that?

K: This cycle of coexisting contradictions, as they are represented in this image of simultaneous consumption and removal – insertion and withdrawal, tells me that there is no “should” in terms of what I listen to and what I see. No mistake is possible, because the opportunity to direct my gaze and ears will repeat, and each time it will be different.

N: That seems like an important step for you to take, accepting that your subjectivity is itself a process, with no finite notions of correct and incorrect approaches to what you perceive. 

K: Indeed…

N: Now the next step, perhaps more difficult, is understanding how others are granted this same liberty.

K: Indeed… this will be a difficult step, seeing as there are no others in my world…

N: But at least you have representations of them, through these works, and our conversation.

K: Yes… please allow me to ruminate on this further, with the violinist as my guide. N: By all means.

III: ON WHAT THE NUDE MAY HIDE

After Kiki meditates on the image of the violinist for approximately 5 hours, she and Niki move upstairs to encounter Evie Leder’s Object Number One (2009; 13:30 Video Loop)

K: Is this a human? I am confused by what I see. It does not look like my body when I am unclothed.

N: This is a human, yes, but not the same type of human as you. It’s a male human, whereas you are female. The different sexes have different… anatomy.

K: Different sexes? Could you please explain?

N: Um… you really haven’t done any research about human anatomy, or reproduction? You must have come across references to “women” vs. “men” – I mean, you’ve watched Star Trek, I know that! And the different sexes are certainly addressed there – I mean, come on.

K: I had not realized that it was a one-to-one distinction between man and woman. It appeared as more of a gradient, or spectrum, to me. At least in Star Trek – which, you are correct, is one of the few media objects I have viewed – the unclothed figure is never shown, and these differences never unveiled.

N: I’d like to hear more about why you haven’t watched any other media objects, and why you’re using that term. But back to the anatomy question – so, do you get it? Men and women have different sexual organs – the sort you see here, and the sort you have in the same spot on your body.

K: I see. You also mentioned reproduction – do you mean the reproduction... of people? And I assume these organs play a role in that. Now what is the function of this reproduction? Is it similar to licensing a video work, as we were discussing before?