Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Pseudomatismos

Pseudomatisms

From The Solar Anus, to other's gaze, we all have our ideas...

Finding people from the past. It's always an invitation for a momentary reflection of who that person was in the past and who you were too. Two strangers on a museum exhibition. Looking at the magnification of their faces through a group of surveillance cameras. Then on a one to one basis, smiling on the room at each other, the mind racing through a quick rolodex of archival networks... Acquaintances, People you Worked With, People you Met Through Your Work, People you Slept With, People your Friends Slept With, People you wanted to Sleep With but Were With Someone Else, or People that Remind You of Someone Else (but were not really them at all on closer inspection).

Talking then to each other. Still trying to pinpoint that sense of familiarity through a certain gesture, a smile, an anecdote that finally ties everything together to your own story. Other memories start flowing. Like a vase of flowers that falls over a table and the liquid runs freely over the glass. There's no hurry to clean the mess. You just watch it drip, petals get wet, things unfold placidly.

Then from that point A in time to a point B being the present, there's a line that has been traced. Trajectories were formed. Judgements are made from words that explain our lives, do we have a world we can show off? Do we have trophies, justifications of our time on earth, kids? Has life been rough? Does our face show deception? Bitterness? Peace? Openess?

The pencil over point B swindles hesitantly over a point C on both strangers notebooks: Will that person from the past, be part of my future?

* One note on Lozano-Hemmer's work. He's absolutely elegant in terms of hiding or integrating the technical side of the work. Now, the functionality of the work is flawless which is a plus in digital media works. Not one was out of order, not one seemed to pretend to be working because the art work was actually not working. People all ages seemed to enjoy it while some traditional artists were appalled, that contrast in 'ole Mexico was amazing.

More about Lozano-Hemmer's work at:

ARTSY