ARTS . Art

Hi Def Jam


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Published: Oct 4, 2006

Right now, right here in Philly, you can see the first 100 percent high-definition media arts show ever in America — possibly in the world. There's neat symmetry in the fact that "America's oldest center of visual, literary and performance arts" (as the Art Alliance bills itself) hosts "Out of Frame" in the youngest art medium. Aside from the HD aspect, which endows shapes and colors with unequaled lucidity and sharpness, these short pieces by 18 artists (most showing more than one work) are diverse in style and content. Some are driven by fractals and computer-generated randomizations. Some offer progressively degraded digitization or restructuring of real filmed scenes (often public domain material sampled from the Internet). Many are animations.

In the manipulated choreography of human swarming in Nell Breyer and Jonathan Bachrach's I:move, people, like bright schools of fish, dart about to the music of the corrida. Kara Crombie, who used to star in her own videos, manipulates local color with soft subtle poetry. The adventures of a hotter, more frenetic palette cycle through Paul Westergard's Happy in My Mouth and Schexy. Peter Rose's work tilts and juxtaposes landscape triptychs, while in Shirley Sarker's Fixed, the image of a woman applying makeup shatters like a mirror. Edward Dormer reorganizes perception by marking sight lines on real trees — documented in a film by Peter Rose. Colin James' Huxley spins an endless sequence of vast perspectival cartoon arcs.

Generally — in spite of contrary intentions — healthy brains seek to identify, decipher and track visual phenomena. Most videos in "Out of Frame" deliberately manipulate and frustrate this deep survival mechanism. In such a skewed perceptual context, mere hints of narrative have an exaggerated impact. In Clothes at the End of the Pond, Esther Bell successfully sustains an ominous mood of suburban violence utterly unjustified by what is actually documented. In Digital Strip, Rob Shaw teases us with evolving digital patterns of a fan dancer. In contrast, Shaw's The Ear is a rounded, witty and horrific silent movie tale. Ben Jones's Dr. Doo TV Document also tells an amusing story.

Curator Ted Passon approached the Art Alliance's Melissa Caldwell with the concept for this show. Both must be commended for a wonderful range of work and a seemingly effortless but, in fact, astonishingly well-thought-out installation.

(r_rice@citypaper.net)

Out of Frame: Motion Art from MOBIUS

Through Dec. 31, Philadelphia Art Alliance,251 S. 18th St., 215-545-4302