"Survival System Train and Other Sculpture" by Kenji Yanobe
http://shiva.subpop.com/coca/kenji/kenji.html
Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle, Washington
Yanobe is a next-generation Japanese artist whose works are visually
stylized on manga (animation, comics and fantasy culture). The exhibition
space is filled with very impressive sculptures: life size radiation proof
suits (complete with Geiger Counters), Strange Machines, Railway tracks and
installations that seem to be modeled in the Riven computer game
techno-object styling tradition.
Analog, heavy, noisy and rusty steel machines that contain personal
emergency-condition storage space and hideaways. Various operational
instrumentation covers the mechanical machine's skin. Personalized
in-suit panels and levers control some of the accessories. The works are
semi-interactive: one needs to learn how to operate these hybrids, and
the only person that holds this "driving license" is the artist himself.
Sometimes, the prostheses are supposed to protect users (The "Yellow
suit"), sometimes they are war-machines, rhizomes used to conquer (The
"Godzilla"), and sometimes they may be used in meditation and balancing
("Tanking machine"). Walking up-and-down the gallery, one gets the
feeling of being in a playground/amusement/theme-park that is filled
with large colorful active toys. The technology seems magical–like what
we encounter in some science-fiction literature… But the pictures that
decorate the gallery's walls remind us of pressing 20th century
ecological and cultural issues like Chernobyl (see
http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~meshkati/humanfactors.html and
http://www.nea.fr/html/rp/chernobyl/), technology's negative social
impact, nuclear contaminated environment and biological weapons. The
pictures portray the artist, Yanobe–all dressed up for the occasion and
for the location in his protective yellow suit, walking around some of
Chernobyl affected sites (Deserted pre-school, amusement park, MI-24
helicopters cemetery)–measuring radiation with personalized
Geiger-enabled gear. The works leads us to reflect on the linkage
between art and technology and on those who create and operate art and
technology.
In the midst of the magical colorful and technological whirlwind, Yanobe
warns us of the danger of improper use of technology. Technology in
itself has no intrinsic moral value; it's not good or bad. It all
depends on how we use it. Yanobe is interested in inventing machines. He
tries to adapt them to would-be future disasters
(http://www.flf.com/crash/index.html). For him, this adaptation is a
sort of survival game. We think that the actual art-making process is
the survival process.
Survival System Train and Other Sculpture
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Type: discussion