Dave Hullfish Bailey
05 May - 25 Jun 2006
DAVE HULLFISH BAILEY
ELEVATOR
May 5 – June 25, 2006
Dave Hullfish Bailey had just begun installing his long planned project Schindler Shelter – a ”temporary disaster playground “ in and around the Schindler House in Los Angeles – in September 2001, when the terror attacks of 9/11 revealed an almost uncanny analogy to a central theme in Bailey’s artistic work: the partial elimination and disorganization of social structures in the wake of catastrophes such as terror attacks, earthquakes or floods as well as the temporary reconfiguration of communities above and beyond ethnicity, religion or political orientation.
For four days, the “disaster playground“ was to offer up to 70 people a “post-apocalyptic refuge“, where together they could perform the necessary survival tasks (such as cooking, creating a place to sleep, etc.) in an emergency situation. Against the backdrop of Rudolf Schindler’s original idea of leading a life in harmony with nature, Bailey studied how moments of extreme mobility and disequilibrium in nature could be applied to a temporary reconfiguration of social relations.
In the Galerie of the Secession, Bailey’s exhibit deals with the industrial mechanisms behind the storage of grain in large silos and explores how this interface of agricultural produce and its processing by means of modern machinery can serve as a metaphor for possible social structures.
Bailey’s work is a social study that refers to concepts of instability and conflict resulting from information that has been arranged and mixed up. In the video shown in the Kreuzraum, Bailey documents the work processes of grain elevators in one of the five large silos at the Alberner Hafen in Vienna. Bailey has observed that the structure of grain on both the micro and macro level is comparable to that of the individual in a group. The individual processing steps and the reactions of the grains create a fine dust through mutual friction. Mixed with air in the right proportions, this dust can trigger enormous explosions.
Bailey sees the instability of dust as an unintended by-product or waste product of the clash of agriculture and industrial production as representing a model of social decline with revolutionary potential. The explosion of dust can be interpreted as an element of loss of control and of release.
The fact that the Secession was briefly given a very different function during World War 2, namely as a grain silo, not only lends the exhibition of Dave Hullfish Bailey an ironic undertone, it also creates an analogy to the history of the building. The Secessionists’ splitting off from the Society of Austrian Visual Artists of the Künstlerhaus in 1897 was symbolized by the creation of a separate exhibition building based on sketches by Joseph Maria Olbrich. At the same time the building of the Artists’ Association marked a decisive moment in the social changes that were taking place in Vienna, at a time, when innovations in modern architecture were pitted against the historicism of a bygone age.
In addition to the video, Bailey’s exhibit includes drawings and sculptures depicting “unintentional combinations“ of everyday language, science and theory. These all stand for the new social structures that can emerge following a total breakdown. By working with words, facts and theories as sculptural material, Bailey distinguishes signs from what is designated, sound from a mode of writing, event from interpretation.
A catalogue with texts by Emily Pethick and Timothy Martin is being produced on the occasion of this exhibition.
DAVE HULLFISH BAILEY, born 1963, lives and works in Los Angeles. EXHIBITIONS (selection): 2005 Bastard Science, Daniel Hug Gallery, Los Angeles; University of Queensland Art Museum, Brisbane; The Lateral Slip, Sweeney Art Gallery, University of California; 2004 Banding Station, IBID Projects, London; Socle du Monde, Herning Kunstmuseum; Groundhog Day, David Pestorius Gallery, Brisbane; Kommando Pfannenkuchen, Daniel Hug Gallery, Los Angeles; Spacemakers, Lothringer Dreizehn, Munich; 2003 World Watchers, NGBK – Neue Gesellschaft für Bildende Kunst, Berlin; Book Trade, Centre d’édition contemporaine, Geneva; Rent-a-Bench, Trapholt Kunstmuseum, Kolding; Affinity Archive, The Metropolitan Complex, Dublin; 2002; Schindler Shelter, Parkhaus im Malkasten, Düsseldorf; Rent-a-Bench, public spaces in Los Angeles; Perspective 2002, Ormeau Baths Gallery, Belfast; Layered Histories, Verein Berliner Künstler, Staatsbank, Berlin; Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now, Low Gallery, Los Angeles; Charley, P.S. 1 Center for Contemporary Art; 2001 20/35 Vision, MAK Center for Art and Architecture at the Schindler House, Los Angeles; New Settlements, Nikolaj Contemporary Art Center, Kopenhagen, Copenhagen; Stone Soup, Three Day Weekend, Los Angeles; 2000 Urban Hyms, California State University, Los Angeles.
www.secession.at
© Dave Hullfish Bailey, o.T., 2005
ELEVATOR
May 5 – June 25, 2006
Dave Hullfish Bailey had just begun installing his long planned project Schindler Shelter – a ”temporary disaster playground “ in and around the Schindler House in Los Angeles – in September 2001, when the terror attacks of 9/11 revealed an almost uncanny analogy to a central theme in Bailey’s artistic work: the partial elimination and disorganization of social structures in the wake of catastrophes such as terror attacks, earthquakes or floods as well as the temporary reconfiguration of communities above and beyond ethnicity, religion or political orientation.
For four days, the “disaster playground“ was to offer up to 70 people a “post-apocalyptic refuge“, where together they could perform the necessary survival tasks (such as cooking, creating a place to sleep, etc.) in an emergency situation. Against the backdrop of Rudolf Schindler’s original idea of leading a life in harmony with nature, Bailey studied how moments of extreme mobility and disequilibrium in nature could be applied to a temporary reconfiguration of social relations.
In the Galerie of the Secession, Bailey’s exhibit deals with the industrial mechanisms behind the storage of grain in large silos and explores how this interface of agricultural produce and its processing by means of modern machinery can serve as a metaphor for possible social structures.
Bailey’s work is a social study that refers to concepts of instability and conflict resulting from information that has been arranged and mixed up. In the video shown in the Kreuzraum, Bailey documents the work processes of grain elevators in one of the five large silos at the Alberner Hafen in Vienna. Bailey has observed that the structure of grain on both the micro and macro level is comparable to that of the individual in a group. The individual processing steps and the reactions of the grains create a fine dust through mutual friction. Mixed with air in the right proportions, this dust can trigger enormous explosions.
Bailey sees the instability of dust as an unintended by-product or waste product of the clash of agriculture and industrial production as representing a model of social decline with revolutionary potential. The explosion of dust can be interpreted as an element of loss of control and of release.
The fact that the Secession was briefly given a very different function during World War 2, namely as a grain silo, not only lends the exhibition of Dave Hullfish Bailey an ironic undertone, it also creates an analogy to the history of the building. The Secessionists’ splitting off from the Society of Austrian Visual Artists of the Künstlerhaus in 1897 was symbolized by the creation of a separate exhibition building based on sketches by Joseph Maria Olbrich. At the same time the building of the Artists’ Association marked a decisive moment in the social changes that were taking place in Vienna, at a time, when innovations in modern architecture were pitted against the historicism of a bygone age.
In addition to the video, Bailey’s exhibit includes drawings and sculptures depicting “unintentional combinations“ of everyday language, science and theory. These all stand for the new social structures that can emerge following a total breakdown. By working with words, facts and theories as sculptural material, Bailey distinguishes signs from what is designated, sound from a mode of writing, event from interpretation.
A catalogue with texts by Emily Pethick and Timothy Martin is being produced on the occasion of this exhibition.
DAVE HULLFISH BAILEY, born 1963, lives and works in Los Angeles. EXHIBITIONS (selection): 2005 Bastard Science, Daniel Hug Gallery, Los Angeles; University of Queensland Art Museum, Brisbane; The Lateral Slip, Sweeney Art Gallery, University of California; 2004 Banding Station, IBID Projects, London; Socle du Monde, Herning Kunstmuseum; Groundhog Day, David Pestorius Gallery, Brisbane; Kommando Pfannenkuchen, Daniel Hug Gallery, Los Angeles; Spacemakers, Lothringer Dreizehn, Munich; 2003 World Watchers, NGBK – Neue Gesellschaft für Bildende Kunst, Berlin; Book Trade, Centre d’édition contemporaine, Geneva; Rent-a-Bench, Trapholt Kunstmuseum, Kolding; Affinity Archive, The Metropolitan Complex, Dublin; 2002; Schindler Shelter, Parkhaus im Malkasten, Düsseldorf; Rent-a-Bench, public spaces in Los Angeles; Perspective 2002, Ormeau Baths Gallery, Belfast; Layered Histories, Verein Berliner Künstler, Staatsbank, Berlin; Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now, Low Gallery, Los Angeles; Charley, P.S. 1 Center for Contemporary Art; 2001 20/35 Vision, MAK Center for Art and Architecture at the Schindler House, Los Angeles; New Settlements, Nikolaj Contemporary Art Center, Kopenhagen, Copenhagen; Stone Soup, Three Day Weekend, Los Angeles; 2000 Urban Hyms, California State University, Los Angeles.
www.secession.at
© Dave Hullfish Bailey, o.T., 2005