“Performing the Portrait” looks at work that explores identity and what it means to be human. Traditional portraiture places emphasis on the face as the main subject, however with the advancement of new technologies, the possibilities of self-representation are limitless. Through performance for the camera, we look to artists that place emphasis on actions that create identifiable referents. Simultaneously self-referential and universal the works challenge the viewer to begin an emotional investigation of the self.

Angela Alexander-Lloyd’s video juxtaposes two figures to create a multilayered portrait evoking stillness and grief. There is a loss of identity and of a familiar self that was formerly anchored to an “other.” Jeffery Byrd invites the viewer to join him while he makes a brief escape from a corporate identity. By presenting a whimsical, yet intimate glimpse of himself singing in his car, we take a leisurely but adventurous parking lot drive along with Byrd. Pedro Galiza searches for himself in Sao Paolo while repetitively screaming his own name on a bridge. The viewer wonders who and where Pedro is; is he a memory or is he just absent from the here and now? Julia Gladstone’s cartoon ontology exposes the strangeness of being. A female figure mourns her fading body as it morphs into the viewer; a meditation and expose on the universal experience and connectedness of life. Salvatore Insana & Dehors/Audela’s work represents an isolated experience of identity. The character seems to be in a constant state of waiting that is punctuated only by brief but intense bodily movements, inaction and ennui.

THU 2 JUN 2016

• Angela Lloyd “punctum”
• Jeffery Byrd “Unchained (for Elvis)“
• Julia Gladstone “The Illusion of Deth”
• Pedro Galiza “Erlebnis 4”
• Salvatore Insana & Dehors/Audela “Lunaris”

“Lunaris”

Subtle, deliberate, suspended evasion by the rules of conduct. internal wounds made of light, space, time. Illogical ways of adaptation and alienation. The house as a lifeline or a cage at risk of choking.
How to inhabit the house of ours fathers by placing our body in order to be pervaded by the spirit in which it remains.
2015 00:08:30
concept Salvatore Insana, Elisa Turco Liveri
film, Editing Salvatore Insana
with Elisa Turco Liveri
music Girolamo Deraco
vibraphone Matteo Cammisa
production Dehors/Audela

Salvatore Insana & Dehors/Audela (Italy)

“The Illusion of Deth”

The Illusion of Deth chronicles an interior theater of “being besides oneself” through the production of a cartoon ontology. A meditation on the strangeness of being, we witness a female figure mourn in a physical feat that renders her fading into the body of the viewer.

Julia Gladstone (USA)

“Erlebnis 4”

Pedro runs the Freguesia do Ó bridge in Inajar de Souza Avenue in the city of São Paulo (where Pedro lives) and it is vomiting its own first name. 2015 00:02:15

The memory of its body is still reverberating in the city’s spacetime . Erlebnis 4 is the testimonial of the absence in here and now, forever.
to perform:
choose a suburban zone
vomits your first name in that place
forever

Pedro Galiza (Brazil)

“Unchained (for Elvis)“

Always try to make a little magic. Everyday.
2015 00:03:32

Jeffery Byrd (USA)

“punctum”

‘punctum’ is the creative response to the intense grief experienced as a result of the unexpected death of the artist’s late husband and is an expression of the grief and longing following the loss of a loved one. . The artist’s intention is to open public discourse on the issues that surround mortality, loss and grief. In addition, the work offers solace through mutual recognition of the cycle of loss inherent in the human condition, to the individual. The video is a standalone work in its own right, but is also part of a larger installation/endurance performance piece where the artist digs through image to the depth of six foot. The title is inspired by the Roland Barthes book, Camera Lucinda.

Angela Alexander-Lloyd (UK)