Karthik Pandian : Jubilee

29 Sep-27 Oct 2012

Overview

Vilma Gold is pleased to announce the first UK solo exhibition by American artist Karthik Pandian (b. 1981, Los Angeles). For 'Jubilee', Pandian premieres a 16mm film that explores artistic affect across the expanse of a half century: the years 1961 and 2011. Drawing on historical references such as Jean Genet’s The Blacks, Ann-Margret’s “Bill Bailey” screen test, Ornette Coleman’s Free Jazz, John Cassavetes’s Shadows, and the “structured improvisations” incubated in the Judson Dance Theatre in the early 1960s, as well as contemporary reimaginings of the era epitomised by the television series Mad Men, the film presents fragmentary documentation of “a happening in two takes” staged for the camera by Pandian in an anonymous black-box theater. Alongside the film, Pandian presents a new body of sculptures and wall-works that further develop his exploration of structure and improvisation.