Julião Sarmento
10 Nov 2012 - 09 Feb 2013
JULIÃO SARMENTO
10 November 2012 – 9 February 2013
In the wake of the two exhibitions in 1988 and 1990, the Giorgio Persano gallery again presents a personal exhibition of works by the Portuguese artist, Julião Sarmento.
The exhibition presents a 4-channel video installation called “Leporello”. The actresses appearing in the work were asked to observe a sequence drawn from a specific pornographic film. Once on the set, and without any rehearsals, the women explained the unfolding of the action, thus creating a verbal cacophony of overlapping voices giving various female narratives of what was going on.
Jerusa Franco, a Brazilian actress who works principally in the field of experimental theatre, Amira Casar, a French film actress, Sasha Grey, a former American porno star who has re-invented herself as a visual artist, and Pamela Butt, a Brazilian porno star, described the sequence in their respective languages, as though they were the principle character in the film.
The work is not translated and bears no subtitles, so that the observer is able to concentrate principally on the language of the sound, and on the performance and body of the performers. Sarmento’s works are always presented in their original language, because they “bear a trace with them, a specific, unchangeable form of information, as though it were the line drawn by a pencil”.
The video alludes to the use of collage, which has always been central to the artist’s work, creating and blending different points of view, each with its authority and distortions. Thanks to the accumulation and assemblage, a new choral narrative action is created and amplified. Through the use of casual or deliberate associations, Sarmento places alternative realities alongside each other in an illusory game of overlapping elements.
Four photographic diptychs are directly linked to the video installation, showing the sequence described in the narratives. Other spaces present recent sculptures and paintings, taken from the video but in a dialogue with its, weaving a relationship between the works on display.
10 November 2012 – 9 February 2013
In the wake of the two exhibitions in 1988 and 1990, the Giorgio Persano gallery again presents a personal exhibition of works by the Portuguese artist, Julião Sarmento.
The exhibition presents a 4-channel video installation called “Leporello”. The actresses appearing in the work were asked to observe a sequence drawn from a specific pornographic film. Once on the set, and without any rehearsals, the women explained the unfolding of the action, thus creating a verbal cacophony of overlapping voices giving various female narratives of what was going on.
Jerusa Franco, a Brazilian actress who works principally in the field of experimental theatre, Amira Casar, a French film actress, Sasha Grey, a former American porno star who has re-invented herself as a visual artist, and Pamela Butt, a Brazilian porno star, described the sequence in their respective languages, as though they were the principle character in the film.
The work is not translated and bears no subtitles, so that the observer is able to concentrate principally on the language of the sound, and on the performance and body of the performers. Sarmento’s works are always presented in their original language, because they “bear a trace with them, a specific, unchangeable form of information, as though it were the line drawn by a pencil”.
The video alludes to the use of collage, which has always been central to the artist’s work, creating and blending different points of view, each with its authority and distortions. Thanks to the accumulation and assemblage, a new choral narrative action is created and amplified. Through the use of casual or deliberate associations, Sarmento places alternative realities alongside each other in an illusory game of overlapping elements.
Four photographic diptychs are directly linked to the video installation, showing the sequence described in the narratives. Other spaces present recent sculptures and paintings, taken from the video but in a dialogue with its, weaving a relationship between the works on display.