Susan Hobbs

lenticoolers

Oliver Husain & Malik McKoy

15 Apr - 20 May 2023

lenticoolers could be best described as two separate shows, with paintings by Malik McKoy and installations by Oliver Husain that overlap here and there and blur together through thematic collaborations.

Texture mapping, usually not visible in the end product, is a step in the process of CGI animation and an element of McKoy’s large-format paintings. Within these vibrant and playful painted scenarios, these spread-out textures, like skin, take on new qualities reflecting an uncanny contemporary existence. The invention of glasses-free 3D cinema in the Soviet Union in the 1940s, or rather the myth of it all, is explored in Husain’s video installation. This conjuncture becomes the starting point for bedazzled approximation and historic speculation. McKoy’s painting and renderings and Husain’s video installation share a similar interest in lenticular effects, in folding and unfolding, flatness and depth, and a critical queer investigation of image technology.