Mathieu Briand
UBIQ: A MENTAL ODYSSEY
20 April-18 June 2006
Opening reception: Wednesday, 19 April, 7-10 pm
featuring a collaborative performance with choreographer Prue Lang at 8 pm
Gallery hours: noon to 6 pm or curtain, closed Mondays
www.redcat.org
The Gallery at REDCAT presents the work of Marseilles-based artist Mathieu Briand in his first solo exhibition in the United States. Briand works in various installation forms with computers, electronic music, robots, video and technology to explore systems of stimulation, play and perception. Briand’s use of new technologies requires active participation and engagement, playing with the viewers point of view and questioning the reality of his/her perceptions. His extraordinary output engages users and mechanisms, technology and anarchy while responding to informal movements in consumption, particularly techno or rave culture and the constant struggle to enhance everyday experience through technology.
Briands exhibition at REDCAT takes its title from the Philip K. Dick sci fi novel, Ubik (1969), and like the novel, explores perception, presence, and utopic expectations of the future. Ubiq: A Mental Odyssey will include the work SYS*05.ReE*03/SE*1\ MoE*2-4, four customized helmets that house small cameras and display monitors that gallery visitors can wear to view the installation. A switching device connected to the helmets allows visitors to exchange visual perspectives with each other. SYS*011. Mie>AbE/SoS\ SYS*010 (The Spiral) is an installation of speakers, turntables and a mixing board connected to a vinyl cutting machine that visitors can use to manipulate existing sound samples, cut a new record, and thereby create new source sounds. Visitors can also combine their own electronic compositions with the artists source tracks to etch new vinyl. Vinyl dubs will be available at cost in the gallery. Ubiq also features the premiere of a new video installation that allows viewers to observe a real-time simulation of the rotation of the earthpart of Briands new body of work that investigates the fantastical future promised by Stanley Kubricks 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Mathieu Briand has participated in numerous exhibitions at Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris; 2001 Istanbul Biennial; ICC, Tokyo; Bloomberg Space, London; 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa; and Musée d’art Contemporain de Lyon. Briand will be in residence at REDCAT during the spring semester of 2006 to work with graduate students from CalArts Schools of Art and Music and The Center for Integrated Media.
Ubiq: A Mental Odyssey is made possible in part by the generous support of Etant Donnés, the French-American Fund for Contemporary Art; The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts; The French Cultural Service in Los Angeles; and 2K by Gingham. Additional support provided by Campari
Exhibition dates: 20 April 18 June 2006
Gallery hours: noon to 6 pm or curtain, closed Mondays
Admission to the gallery is always free
Visit www.redcat.org or call 1.213.237.2800 for more information
Up next in the Gallery:
June-August 2006 Nothing is Neutral: Andrea Bowers
September-November 2006 Snake River: Charles Gaines and Edgar Arceneaux
REDCAT
631 West 2nd Street
Los Angeles, CA 90012 USA
