(Rio de Janeiro, Brazil)
Celina Portella presents from today the solo show “Movimento²” [“Movement”] at the Hélio Oiticica Arts Town Center. The exhibition comprises two video series where the body moves interacting with the edges of the monitor frame. There are five artworks, three monitors separately fixed on the wall, one monitor stuck to a horizontal track and another stuck to a vertical track. The shape of the video presentation support defines the body’s dimensions, time and actions in the image, transforming the artworks in video-objects.
In the three fixed monitors, the relationship with space is made different by the varied dimensions of the body inside the frame. In the first, the body appears in small scale, occupying a large space and moving freely. In the second the space is reduced, a larger scale body can reach all the frame edges. In the third, the body dimensions barely fit inside the frame, it is shrunk, with limited moves.
On the horizontal track the screen moves sidewards in synch with the body’s action, that pushes the right or left edge inside the frame. On the vertical track, each time the “actress” hangs herself on the top edge, the screen goes down, so when she pulls the bottom edge, the screen goes up. The monitors’ come and go obeys to a continuous action, uncut, stopping at different points in the tracks and obeying to similar stimuli, although none are the same.
The project “Movimento²”, developed during a residency at the Image and Sound Museum in São Paulo (MIS SP), was carried out in three stages: structure assemblage, recording, editing and objects assemblage. Defining the monitor shapes and models, type of camera, recording, structures and wall format depended on each other, therefore the idea development was an elaborated process, with countless tests and deep research about the means, mediums, equipment and setting available. Conceiving of a recording script and organizing the takes and length of each action depend on the tracks dimensions and on the speed of their movements. About the project, Celina says, “I consider my experience in this residency to be extremely important, because of the opportunity of developing a work that aroused a particular, conceptual interest in me, and because it provided me a complex, technical knowledge, larger than any other previous experience.”
“Movimento²”, solo show by Celina Portela
On view through 12th February 2015
Admission
Centro Municipal de Arte Hélio Oiticica
Rua Luís de Camões, 68 – Centro
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