A new video exhibition, “Parallel Screens,” aims to grab — and challenge — audiences’ attention. The project, developed during Brunno Silva’s three-month curatorial residency at Porto Vista Hotel, features work from 24 individuals across the world, including local San Diegans like Nick Lesley, Lissa Corona, Allison Beaudry, Flavia D’Urso, Jessica Ling Findley, Meredith Sward and Justin McHugh.
The São Paulo-born Silva, who curated and developed the project on-site at 1805 Gallery and Porto Vista Hotel, also visited local artists’ studios and held an eight-part lecture series delving into the video medium.
Two large screens, situated parallel to each other, will show a two-hour video of two pieces showing at the same time on opposite screens, with a single audio feed. The videos that play concurrently are intentionally paired, submitted as complementary works by the same artist, or as extra or split footage of a single project. It’s a challenge to the viewer’s attention span, navigating which screen to watch, when and for how long. “This exhibition is very much the celebration of the medium, and how people are using the medium now,” Silva said.
The installation starts with a simpler piece, by renowned Brazilian artist Carla Chaim, who plays around with stark white moveable walls in a gallery, using two video feeds of varying angles. “It’s a visual cat and mouse game, isn’t it?” said Silva. When the subject leaves the field of vision on one screen, audiences are compelled to check the parallel screen, expecting her to emerge there next. The flow of videos ramps up to chaotic, then returns to calmer videos to finish. Each video ranges from a minute to upward of 20 minutes.
“People feel that they don’t have that vocabulary to enter into a conversation about video art,” said Lauren Siry, who coordinates the arts program at Porto Vista Hotel and runs 1805 Gallery. She added that Silva’s lectures and studio visits have helped build an open-minded, engaged audience and community. “We’re in a feedback loop locally,” she said of Silva’s critical insight.
San Diego artist, arts administrator and educator Lissa Corona’s contribution is a two-channel piece consisting of simultaneous footage from reality shows: Bravo’s “Real Housewives,” and Oxygen’s “Bad Girls Club,” shows she regularly watches.
The well-dressed housewives are shown crying without context, whereas the footage from “Bad Girls Club” — a show that glamorizes the fighting, violence and destructive behaviors of so-called “bad girls” — shows the girls smiling, embracing and bonding. This contrast and subversion is just the first layer of Corona’s piece; the “Bad Girls Club” “happy” footage is taken moments before or after the girls bullied someone else, which reveals “the menacing truth of camaraderie discovered through bullying,” said Corona.
Corona is no stranger to video and experimental art. “I think viewing video art in exhibition spaces is more about the experience of dedicating time to really embrace the work and its content. It requires patience and allowing one’s self to be present with the work,” Corona said.
Silva agreed. “There is a massive distance between how we consume video in the gallery and how we consume video in our lives,” he said. Even with TV or viral clips, we view on demand, binge watch, mute or skip ahead, always in total control. For his exhibit, he wanted to better approximate that in the gallery – each piece begins with a title and its duration, so audiences know where they are in the two-hour project and can feel free to leave or walk in at any time.
But Silva doesn’t want to sequester all control to a viewer, and still wants audiences to experience the video in an immersive environment where he — and his equipment — can guarantee sound, quality and attention, like movie theaters continue to do with film. “I just want to bring people to the gallery to see it,” he said. “Just like cinemas. Why do we still have cinemas?”
“Parallel Screens” launches with a rooftop viewing on oversized screens at Porto Vista Hotel on Wednesday, and will continue with viewings inside 1805 Gallery through Aug. 11.
A Local ‘Miss Saigon,’ Toxic Masculinity and More News for the Culture Crowd
- Art Power at UCSD announced its 2019-2020 season, and reflected on the success of last year’s programming, including an increase in student attendance thanks to a concerted outreach effort. (U-T)
- As if you needed any more reasons to swing by Balboa Park after work on Fridays. There are food trucks all summer long, yes, but also “History Happy Hour” with cocktails in the San Diego History Center lobby from 4-7, half-price admission at the Natural History Museum after 5 p.m. (plus its rooftop bar is always admission-free) discounted admission to the Fleet and extended hours at many institutions.
- Local darlings Shades McCool play at Soda Bar on Friday, and I loved this take on the way the band tackles toxic masculinity (and local car dealer jingles) with parody, whilst also rocking. (CityBeat)
- Saturday’s Not-So-Silent Short Film Fest is curated by the ever-innovative Scott Paulson and live-scored by his band, the Teeny-Tiny Pit Orchestra, with additional accompaniment from … you (via Paulson’s collection of weird noisemakers).
- On Saturday, the New Children’s Museum prepares us for Comic-Con with “Superheroes’ Night Out.” The event also includes a comic drawing workshop with Little Fish Comic Book Studios.
- San Diego Opera just nabbed three California Arts Council Grants, which will support existing youth programs like “Words and Music” and “Student Night at the Opera.” Other than a slight increase (from $47,700 to $50,400), this news is pretty much identical to last year. (Opera Wire)
- Monday morning, post-holiday weekend doesn’t exactly scream “lecture” but for Roman de Salvo, resident artist at the Timken and creator of the magical Electric Picnic large-scale installation, I’d make an exception. If you can swing it, do!
- The Broadway production of “Miss Saigon” hits the Civic Theater on July 9, and with it comes the City Heights-raised, Preuss School-grad actress Jackie Nguyen, who plays Kim. In 2012, Nguyen was also, notably, “the first-ever Vietnamese-American actor to play Kim, the Vietnamese heroine.” (U-T)
Closing Soon
- The Fleet Science Center’s IMAX film, “Great Barrier Reef” closes on Thursday. Don’t be too sad; it’s being replaced by a turtle movie!
- The San Diego Art Prize winner exhibition at the Athenaeum in La Jolla closes on Saturday, featuring collaborative works by Anne Mudge with Erin Dace Behling and Robert Matheny with Max Daily.
- The Aja Project’s exhibition of student work at Sparks Gallery closes on Sunday.
Food, Etc.
- This roundup of predictions for what San Diego will look like in 50 years is bonkers. Food critic Troy Johnson’s blurb about meat speakeasies is basically a dystopian short story. (San Diego Magazine)
- The Guild Hotel is freshly opened in the former YMCA building on Broadway downtown, and the lobby bar’s cocktail program is already turning heads (and redeeming past mistakes). (CityBeat)
- True Craft, Stone’s (ambitious) $100 million bailout program for fledgling breweries, quietly did not happen. (Pacific)
- On why hemp CBD products are somehow still illegal in California: “The California Department of Public Health has been yanking products off the shelves, but doesn’t want to talk about it.” (Los Angeles Times)
- Oceanside opened a zero-waste, community-minded green kitchen with the O’Side Kitchen Collaborative, turning food waste into opportunities. (KPBS)
- “If you buy this: You’re a Mukbang YouTuber with plans to upload a video titled “i almost DIED?!?” and it’s 43 minutes long.” The illustrated guide to what your H-Mart (now open on Balboa!) purchase says about you. (Los Angeles Times)
What’s Inspiring Me Right Now
- I am part-way through the first volume of Chelsea Cain’s comic “Man-Eaters.” I loved this snarky list of the ways it violates the “comics code of 1954.” (For the concerned, yes, the code has been updated a few times since the ‘50s). A gem from the article: “The opening page shows Maude daydreaming about a superhero who is actually a tampon. Not only does this violate the rules for unsavory illustrations, but even worse, it could also make male readers uncomfortable.” (Bleeding Cool)