#SleekAlphaSelfie captured with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha
In our “Me, Myself and Art” series, in collaboration with Samsung Galaxy Alpha, Sleek takes an immersive approach to the art world. Via the medium of writer and stylist Ella Plevin, and her shiny new Samsung Galaxy Alpha, we bring the art world to you in a uniquely personalised way, utilising performance, selfies and video to present new perspectives on the art scene. Check out #SleekAlphaSelfie to win a phone for yourself.
I caught the after-party but skipped the opening of Canadian artist Jeremy Shaw’s new show “Hot 100s” a couple of weeks ago, so I thought it was time I headed to Johann König gallery to see what I had missed. Shaw, based in Berlin since 2007, has been treating the city as a crucible for his interests in altered states and transcendental experience. Whether via psychoactive drugs, electronic music, cinema or spirituality, the German capital offers an exit for everyone.
Transcendental Capacity (Billboard Hot 100s), taken with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha
…and a #sleekalphaselfie with the corresponding song lists (taken with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha)
The gallery presented “Transcendental Capacity (Billboard Hot 100s)”: panels of 101 mounted polaroid photographs made using the Kirlian process, just one example of the psycho-surveying processes to offer an insight into the altered states Shaw is so interested in. Photographic film is placed over a metal discharge plate, high voltage is applied and any “corona discharge” between an object placed directly onto the film and the plate is exposed onto the film. The Polaroids look like a neat catalogue of tiny utopias, islet escapes; but are actually Kirlian exposures of the artist’s fingerprint made whilst listening to (American) Billboard Hot 100 hits in complete darkness.
This Transition Will Never End at Johann König Gallery, taken with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha
In a corridor stretching from the gallery entrance to the room holding the Polaroids, ongoing work “This Transition Will Never End” pulls together a selection of appropriated TV and movie footage depicting a vortex or similar spiralling tunnel used to suggest time slippage or movement between planes of reality.
A detail from “This Transition Will Never End” at Johann König Gallery, taken with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha.
I thought of a Susan Hiller retrospective I saw at the Tate Britain three years ago, particularly of her “aura” photos and “Psi Girls” piece. I wondered what she would think of the work, whether she and Shaw might have already met in person and how their auras might compare.
#SleekAlphaSelfie with work by Jeremy Shaw, captured with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha
The rest of the gallery was dedicated to Jorinde Voigt’s beautiful drawings – more cryptic representations of mental planes and experiences, this time governed by the artist’s very particular set of rules and conceived by hand like sheet music to an alien score.
#SleekAlphaSelfie with work by Jorinde Voigt, captured with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha
Text by Ella Plevin
To see more from our Me, Myself and Art series and to enter to win a Samsung Galaxy Alpha of your own, check out our #SleekAlphaSelfie competition
Check out previous entries here on our #SleekAlphaSelfie Tumblr.
Drawings by Jorinde Voigt on display at Johann König, taken with the Samsung Galaxy Alpha.