A Visibility Matrix, Ireland
The Douglas Hyde Gallery
Trinity College
Dublin, Ireland
Videostill from Caminata Nocturna by Karl Ingar Røys
The
Douglas Hyde Gallery is delighted to present an ambitious new artwork
that explores the politics and conditions of visibility. Initiated by
Dublin-based artists and long-term collaborators, Sven Anderson and
Gerard Byrne, 'A Visibility Matrix' assembles contributions from a
distributed panel of artists, film-makers and others within a
synchronised, multi-channel video installation that will be presented
for the first time in Gallery 1 of The Douglas Hyde Gallery. 'A Visibility Matrix' unfolds as a response to the ambitions of abandoned art and technology projects from the 1960s–1980s that prioritised multiscreen video projection, monitor arrays, communications networks and algorithmic composition principles. These projects explored visual excess and hyperstimulation prior to the development of the Internet, and before multi-screen video displays expanded into the vernacular backdrop of everyday public and private life. Considered now, the plural voices of these experiments in perception and communication simultaneously prophesise and bypass the homogenised conditions that have come to be accepted as network culture.
Exploring the paradigms of what we see and how we construct visual knowledge, 'A Visibility Matrix' returns to the instincts of these projects. It proposes a condensed counterpoint to the migratory, hyper-networked nature of visibility in contemporary culture by conjuring an offline matrix of video material presented in the gallery space for communal observation. The artwork speculates on an alternative to the composite formed by subject + smartphone + online-video-sharing-platf
'A Visibility Matrix' manifests as a network of screens and spatial gestures, in which we observe images being duplicated, mirrored and displaced. These gestures unfold over days and months of exhibition, pursuing both repetition and re-assembly. This system speculates on the possibilities of video not as passive image but as an active signal, and the gallery as a site of condensation; a shared space and a space of reflection.
The extended-duration sequences that surface through the artwork are assembled from video material aggregated from a network of collaborators including:
Daniel & Marie Law Adams Rosa Aiello Aaron Anderson Matthew Bakkom Rosa Barba Eric Baudelaire Ericka Beckman Maeve Brennan Andreas Bunte Duncan Campbell Jonas Dahlberg Matija Debeljuh Jeanette Doyle Dennis Del Favero Moritz Fehr Diego Ferrari Darko Fritz Rene Gabri & Ayreen Anastas Mariam Ghani & Chitra Ganesh Ross Gibson Judith Goddard Igor Grubić Jennie Guy Louis Haugh Kathy High Klara Hobza Jere Ikongio & Katja Kellerer John Lalor Charles Lim Jeanne Liotta LoVid Fiona Marron Hrvoje Mabić Ivan Marušić Klif Nicholas Mangan Edward Mattiuzzi Peter Maybury Ronan McCrea Conor McGarrigle Toni Meštrović Abinadi Meza Suzanne Mooney Nadija Mustapić Arnont Nongyao Dietmar Offenhuber Tadhg O'Sullivan Jack Phelan Piyarat Piyapongwiwat Jason Quinlan Eugenia Raskopoulos Lucy Raven Ben Rivers Karl Ingar Røys Adam Sekuler Craig Smith Michael Bell-Smith Stephanie Spray Steve Sprung Danae Stratou José Carlos Teixeira Leslie Thornton Gabriele Trapani Sara Velas Jeremy Welsh Clemens von Wedemeyer Grace Weir Krzysztof Wodiczko Tintin Wulia
This material was gathered, filtered and annotated working with editorial collaborators Matthew Bakkom, Victoria Brooks, Rhea Dall, Moritz Fehr, Igor Grubić, Dan Kidner, Nikos Papastergiadis and Oraib Toukan, and assembled with support from Louis Haugh and Fiona Marron.
'A Visibility Matrix' is an artwork formed through its infrastructure, system design and spatial permutations. The artwork will continue to evolve as it moves from space to space, from the Toulouse Arts Festival in September 2018 to Void Gallery in Derry/Londonderry in January 2019.
