Throwbacks need not attackBy Spencer Young
Detail from collage by Bjorn Copeland at Jack Hanley Gallery. All photos by Spencer Young.
Black Dice member and visual artist Bjorn Copeland is currently showing a collage of found objects at Jack Hanley Gallery. “Hope It Works” is akin to the nauseating aesthetic of electronic collagists Paper Rad and Dan Deacon. The origins of this aesthetic are typically culled from the prepubescent technologies and pop culture of the 1980s and 1990s: cassette tapes, VCRs, CDs, TV, Nintendo, workout machines, leotards, too much hairspray, you name it. It’s nauseating because the color palette of this era was of a disastrous, fluorescent variety; the kind that disseminated through flashing TV sets across America, inducing both seizures and vomit the color of neon rainbows -- a scenario that each of these artists’ music videos tries to hyperactively reenact.
Black Dice, “Kokomo”
Paper Rad, “the peace tape” (music by Extreme Animals)
Dan Deacon, “Ultimate Reality” (video by Jimmy Joe Roche)
While there are interesting differences between each video (Roche’s video at least is more paced, abstract, and artsy), all of them are equivalent to a 14-year-old spending his entire Saturday afternoon stuck in a frenzied, yet lazy, feedback loop of sugary cereals, TV, video games, and masturbation. And while this is hilarious and nostalgic for some (myself included), there are only so many times you can watch these videos before your brain goes numb -- just as there are only so many bowls of Cinnamon Toast Crunch you can eat before you black out and so much repetitive A and B/ Up and Down button tapping your thumb can take before it blisters and so many hasty, non-lubricated jo sessions you can carry through before your penis falls off.
The objects in “Hope It Works” provide relief in this respect. By bypassing viscerally violent violets for the warmer and more worn colors of the 1970s and 1980s, Copeland invites the viewer to relax and stay a while. And because the palette is less harsh and the objects more ordinary, you get the sense that these collages aren’t dripping entirely in parody. Instead of extreme content you get extreme attention to detail. The piece 1, 2, 3 playfully points to form, which gets transferred from real to artificial and from 3D to 2D.
Collage by Bjorn Copeland at Jack Hanley Gallery
Brian Copeland, 1, 2, 3
There’s also homage, via the warped LP and dilapidated yet functioning record players; and appreciation, via the well-designed signs and posters that get small, complimentary splices and switch-a-roos by Copeland’s attentive collaging techniques. Phew. Pulses have slowed down. Pastiche can finally breathe.
BRIAN COPELAND: HOPE IT WORKS
Continues through Dec 5
Jack Hanley Gallery
395 Valencia, SF
(415) 522 1623
www.jackhanley.com
EXTREME ANIMALS (of Paper Rad)
With Nero’s Day at Disneyland
Sat/14, 8 p.m.
21 Grand
416 25th, Oakland
(510) 444 7263
www.21grand.org
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