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CalArts, Bijou Theater

FILM/VIDEO: Involution, a program of short video works by Ivan Argote, Balam Bartolome, Amy Howden-Chapman, Christian Franco, Oliver Laric, Lindsay Lawson, Sara Ludy and Anne de Vries, with Ivan Argote, Amy Howden-Chapman and curators Temra Pavlovic and Michael Ray-Von. This screening is in tandem with an exhibition of these works at Otras Obras in Tijuana, BC, MX, opening Friday, 8 Feb., from 6-10 PM.

It doesn't set a ground for this is true, and this is not true.  With an involutionary continuum the means of assessment (of the origin and the destination) are always in question.  “They're in a state of becoming but, I wanna not say that word.”  The form we're talking about exists between these two terms: the medium and the substrate.  

Involution as a radical rethinking of historical narratives and social formations.  A social architecture is an assemblage of images, the form of which constitutes a temporary continuum of identity.  The continuum tends toward behaviors; tropes.  Existing in parallel are potential alternate formations of a given social image.  Innumerable heads inhabiting a single body; a coexistence of influences.  By exploiting or exploding the tendencies, or tropes, of a given formation: alternate formations occur.   The result is a lingering self-recognition, a turning out upon itself, an involution.  Exposing an interiority that carries the potentials of all possible exteriorities.  Laying bare the genetic material.

With an evolution, the relationship between a preceding form and its successor is fixed.  An involution occurs when the hierarchy of those fixed identities is complicated.  An identity in time is given question as to whom is the actor, and whom is being acted upon.  And this sets the identity into a crisis where the means for assessing the terms of progression are lost.  

The dancer is practicing in front of the mirror.  The mirror is practicing in front of the dancer.  The camera is the dancer, and the television is the mirror.  And the video-feedback itself is neither the camera nor the television, it's something that's between the two terms.  And its always-already occurring everywhere all the time.  

Emancipate the logic of civilization to serve as a catalyst for an involution of form, as an instrument for treason against a stagnating social formation.  Involution is an auto-betrayal.  This exhibition is a consideration of the terms under which an involution may take place.

Amy Howden-Chapman is a Los Angeles based artist and writer, born in 1984 in Wellington, New Zealand. She has an honors degree in Art History, Victoria University, Wellington (2006), a Masters degree in Creative Writing, Victoria University, Wellington (2005) and in 2011 she graduated from California Institute of the Arts with a Master in Fine Arts.

Ivan Argote (born 1983 in Bogota, Colombia) studied design and new media at the National University of Colombia in Bogota as well as fine arts at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts de Paris. Argote works with mixed media: His (video) performances, photography, sculptures, paintings, new media and video art often share “humour with a rebellious twist” and comment “on the ways we traditionally regard art” (Da Wire). “My works are reflections about the way we behave, about how we understand our close environment, and about how this close environment is related with history, traditions, art, politics and power. Creating these reflections in a playful spirit, this allows me to work with great freedom in different ways, which also is a comment about the way one works on art” (Idol Magazine, 2011) explains the young artist, who however already enjoys international attention. Argote presented his work at solo exhibitions in acclaimed art institutions such as Palais de Tokyo, Paris; CA2M, Madrid; D+T Project, Brussels and elsewhere. In addition, Argote has been invited to 30th Sao Paulo Biennale, Brazil and numerous group exhibitions in Europe, USA and South America.