Beyond the Screen

By Kevin Madness

From the cell phone and the iPod to the ever-present glow of the television, we’re constantly drawn to the illuminated rectangles that frame our entertainment, information, and realities.

Perhaps the screen is the canvas of the new age. Maybe with an artistic touch, it can teach us a little about the incomprehensible process of perception or, at the least, change the way we view art.

Through the Other End of the Telescope, an exhibition hosted by the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art (SMoCA), celebrates the use of film and video in art. It’s the twelfth installment of Southwest Net, a series that features emerging contemporary artists from the southwestern United States.

“It’s an exhibition that explores the material properties of the moving image,” explains Cassandra Coblentz, curator of the show. “There are four different artworks in the exhibition, and each one contributes to the topic in a different way.”

Part of that exploration is allowing the viewer to interact with the art. This project features instillation art—an artwork that completely takes up the space it’s shown on and goes on to include the space itself in the piece—sort of like an esthetic incarnation of The Blob. Traditionally, a piece of art is treated as a precious object that cannot be altered or manipulated. Conversely, each instillation featured in the film and video exhibition can be appreciated differently depending on the viewer’s interaction with it—and in some cases, it is essential.

At first look, Reel to Reel is confounding. The instillation, created by Texas artists Jon Fisher and Jeff Shore, initially looks like a sinuous mess of exposed wires and electrical components connecting a record player, a monitor, and other devices. It’s actually a complicated system of automated mechanical sculptures that coact to create music and video in real time—the art is customized through the viewer’s interaction with it.

Artist Jon Fisher says some sculptures house miniature sets that can be seen through small and sometimes movable surveillance cameras. Others are electronic musical devices that create a soundtrack to go with the images. Playing with these sculptures, the viewer is unknowingly creating video and music that they will soon see projected onto the wall.

“The most interesting thing is when [the viewer] begins to discover the relationship between the two elements,” Fisher says. “As they recognize that the video is coming from within the sculptures, there is often an ‘aha!’ moment when everything else becomes clear.”

Along with interaction, perception is an important theme in Through the Other End of the Telescope.

Los Angeles-based artist Mungo Thomson deals with theme by referencing art history. He’s projected a negative print of artist Nam June Paik’s Zen for Film, using a rare and archaic 16mm model, transforming specs of dust into a starscape enveloping the wall.

With the old projector working in full view, viewers are given a behind-the-curtain view, making the production process seem like part of the sculpture.

The exhibition also features Los Angeles artist Jennifer West’s oversized video projections from cleverly abused film cells and Aaron Rothman’s atmospheric Where You Are and Where You Can Never Be, an instillation inseparable from the art museum’s architecture.

Rothman, representing Phoenix, utilized the museum’s skylights along with photographs and projected images of clouds to create a piece of art without borders. The intended result is the viewers becoming aware that they are within the art and hence are more conscious of their perception.

“What I hope is that it all points towards a singular experience,” Rothman says of the show. “The thread that ties everything together is the viewers’ experience in trying to create an awareness of how you encounter your place in the world.”

Through the Other End of the Telescope presents art in a unique way that exercises your perception as television does not. The next time you find yourself starring blankly at a television screen, turn it off and come to the museum for a video experience you won’t soon forget.

Through the Other End of the Telescope will be featured at SMoCA until January 24, 2010. Visit smoca.org for more information about this and other museum exhibits and events.