Take your time with ‘art/tapes/22′

JOHN BALDESSARI’S ‘THE ITALIAN TAPE’

Thirty minutes with the University Art Museum’s “art/tapes/22” isn’t enough. Two hours, even, is too short. For those who worry about the appropriate amount of time to spend appreciating a painting or photograph—fearing, somehow, that a message can be lost if we don’t wait around long enough to receive it —this show is a blessing.

Spend time with these works, UAM Curator of Exhibitions Alice Hutchison urged. And so it was that an hour blocked out to take in “art/tapes/22,” named after the video studio ran by Maria Gloria Bicocchi in Florence, Italy, from 1973 to 1976, turned into two and very nearly three.

Here’s why: The exhibition, a collection of video works (recently restored by the Venice Biennale Foundation’s Historic Archives of Contemporary Arts) by artists like Eleanor Antin, Urs Lüthi and Bill Viola, amuses, confuses, challenges and entertains, presented in a manner—via TVs and projectors—with which everyone is familiar. That the museum walls are painted a blinding white and the videos shot mainly in black and white only heightens the experience, triggering an anti-living room sensation, not just wiping away any considerations for time, but our notions of it.

Doug Davis’ 22-minute 1974 video, Clothing, Walking, Lifting, Leaving, was the first that I sat in front of, putting headphones on just in time to hear Davis command “Hold up your television screen with me. Put your hands against mine, through the screen, pressing against me.” In the video, a naked Davis (having previously asked that you strip your clothes off with him and throw them at the screen during the “clothing” segment) presses against a sheet of glass that doubles as the screen itself, reaching out and seemingly begging for connection.

This was “lifting,” and next there would be “leaving,” where Davis puts his clothes on, from underwear to pants and a sweater, backs away and exits the screen, almost excruciatingly slowly. “We must leave together now,” he says, “We must leave the television set in this room.” He could also be saying “and this room.” Either way, you’re not leaving—you’re still watching. (What if he comes back?)

During Clothing, I found myself removing the headphones and scooting along the bench, only to slide back again to continue watching. I had to finish it—had to see if he’d ask the one obvious question: “Are you still there?” He didn’t, but I was, and I was giggling.

In fact, for an exhibit that could be viewed as so self-serious—if you were to simply walk around and gaze at the works as though they were on canvas, the pitfall of things being black and white and experimental—sitting with these pieces, actually allowing myself the attention span many of the videos (and there are lots) required, I considered much of “art/tapes/22” very playful.

There is Dan Graham’s Past Future Split Attention (1972-1973), 17 minutes of two men—Graham being one of them, presumably—talking simultaneously (in some cases talking about talking simultaneously), one man beginning his statements with “You will,” at least initially telling the other one what to do, the opposite man responding with “You have,” talking about the first man’s history. Just trying to follow along is at once unnerving and so entertaining (“You will be pleased when I stop talking.”).

Elsewhere, Chris Burden’s 1975 Guru for Detroit features a looped, rambling conversation—the kind we all make at some point after much alcohol or very little sleep—about cars, about Hondas and smog and Pacers and the failure of Detroit design (eerie in modern times). When it jumps back to repeat the rambling, it’s suddenly funny and maybe intentionally so—we’ve all suffered (and subjected others to) this kind of brain vomit.

Whether you appreciate “art/tapes/22” for its historical significance—many of these works have been largely unseen for the last 30 years—or for its accessible humor (though there is a lot of darkness to be witnessed as well), the show is ultimately worth a visit for the medium itself, something in many ways so archaic now, but at the time new and fascinating to these artists. “Art/tapes/22” satisfies by letting us witness this—you just need a little time.

ART/TAPES/22 UNIVERSITY ART MUSEUM | CAL STATE LONG BEACH | 1250 BELLFLOWER BLVD | LONG BEACH 90840 | 562.985.5761 | CSULB.EDU/UAM | OPEN TUES-SUN NOON-5PM | $4; FREE FOR CSULB STUDENTS AND STAFF | PUBLIC RECEPTION SAT 6-8PM | GALLERY TALK WITH CURATOR ALICE HUTCHINSON TUES 12:15-1PM | THROUGH OCT 19

Tags: bill viola, doug davis, Long Beach, university art museum, video art