'The Garden of Emoji Delights' from Carla Gannis

Halloween Screening ::: FRIDAY October 31 ::: from 7 -11PM
Hosted at KING'S TAVERN
949 Grand Street, Brooklyn NY 11211
(just two blocks from TRANSFER)

TRANSFER is pleased to present the NYC debut of Carla Gannis’ ‘Garden of Emoji Delights’ with a screening and Emoji Halloween Celebration.

Carla Gannis’s work examines the narrativity of 21st century representational technologies and questions the hybrid nature of identity, where virtual and real embodiments of self diverge and intersect.

In ‘The Garden of Emoji Delights’, Gannis contextualizes Emoji within the iconographic lineage of the works of Hieronymus Bosch, re-inscribing the third panel of his triptych, The Garden of Earthly Delights, by using the new secular, pop vocabulary of signs and digital symbols. These symbols are as pervasive now as religious symbology was in the 15th and 16th centuries. According to Carla Gannis, Emoji add a new flatness to the iconography of the past, emptying it of controversy and replacing it with something akin to Murakami’s Superflat aesthetic questioning the “sins” of our contemporary consumer culture.

This screening event is a collaborative presentation of Gannis’ solo show at Kasia Kay Gallery in Chicago. The exhibition on view October 17 – November 15 is an installation of a large scale triptych, which comprises digitally collaged emoji symbols and animated characters into Hieronymus Bosch’s painting The Garden of Earthly Delights, (1500-1505), along with a small 3-D printed sculpture entitled " Escape Pod", a collaboration between Gannis and Everett Kane that explores the theatrical poetries of the modern domicile.

On Halloween evening TRANSFER presents the large-scale digital animation from Gannis’ ongoing project and an Emoji Halloween reception hosted by our neighbors King’s Tavern. The mediated version of her masterpiece contains over a dozen looping narratives across all three emojified realms: Eden, Hell and Earth. A large-scale projection installed in King’s Tavern outdoor courtyard, will be accompanied by 12 screens inside the Tavern screening HD looped moving image details from the animations (available in digital editions).

Emoji costumes are encouraged!


CARLA GANNIS lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. She has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions both nationally and internationally. Gannis is the recipient of several awards and her work has been featured or reviewed in The Huffington Post, Wired, Art F City, Hyperallergic, The Wallstreet Journal, & The New York Times, among others. Most recently she collaborated with poet Justin Petropoulos on a transmedia book, installation and net art project entitled (Jaded Ibis Press and Transfer Gallery, 2013). She is faculty and Assistant Chair of the Department of Digital Arts at Pratt Institute. Carla Gannis is represented by Kasia Kay Art projects Gallery in Chicago and by Transfer Gallery in New York.

Acknowledgements: Rafia Olufemi Santana, Studio Assistant


One-night Event ::: Screening + Emoji Halloween Reception
Friday, October 31 from 7PM–Midnight
Hosted at KING’S TAVERN 949 Grand Street, Brooklyn NY 11211 ::: kingstavernny.com

Schedule a private viewing or inquire for more details with [email protected]