Marjo Viitala
Event Horizon
Galleria Huuto Uudenmaankatu
28 May – 15 June 2014
On Ascension Day (thursday 29.5.) galleries are open 12-17, welcome!
My Event Horizon exhibition explores one of the basic human needs, closeness.
Just like in science, in the world of art it is often easier to explore the existence of a concept through the absence thereof. Therefore, the starting point for my works is longing for closeness rather than the existence of closeness. Longing for closeness is a need to be seen and understood. It is a need to be close to someone both physically and mentally.
The exhibition includes two video works.
Home with sex
This work is an investigation into a person’s inner speech and messages that do not go through the way they want them to.
I have filmed two people in the same space using two different cameras. The essential part of the method is to repeat the same sentence, with variation. The persons who are filmed do not know their partner’s sentence when they begin. They hear what the other one says and are able to get an impulse from the other person’s words. When their eyes are closed, they focus more on their own words. This results in a diverse dialog of minimal elements.
The work consists of two videos, two people and two perspectives in the same situation. One of the videos is 10 seconds shorter and therefore during the first cycle they are synchronized but for every other cycle they are always 10 more seconds out of sync, until finally the images are in sync again and the cycle begins all over again. Each cycle provides a new interpretation of the situation.
Mirror
The mirror game is a metaphor for people’s social relationships. There are two kinds of people, those who try to get close to other people and those who try to keep their distance from others, in other words seekers and avoiders. Both of these behavior models are defense mechanisms, strategies to protect us from being abandoned. What happens is that the seeker tries to get closer than the avoider wants them to and thus they only increase the distance between them. When the seeker backs off, the avoider gives the seeker another chance to get close. The same thing happens again. It turns into a complex social scheme – the avoider can sometimes be one of the seekers. It is hard to avoid participating in the game. If you do not take part in the game, you never encounter the other person and there will only be distance between you.
The intensity of the protection mechanism varies in different situations. If, for example, sudden success adds a significant number of new players to the game or changes the direction of the seeker-avoider game, the situation may not only confuse the players but it may also reach a critical point and the mechanism can easily be seen as exploitation and/or jealousy. When playing the game, the mirror is expected to be honest. In real life and when there is power imbalance, it is tempting to be dishonest. It is easier to let one person come closer than someone else, whether they make mistakes or not.
The work consists of a video, five interviews and an interactive video projection.
In addition to myself, the following people have taken part in the works:
Mirror
Concept planning Jarkko Virtanen, filming Mikael Gustafsson and Anton Verho, sound Miki Brunou, image coding Aleksi Pihkanen, editing and color grading Jaakko Rinne
Home with sex
Filming Anton Verho, sound Miki Brunou, editing and color grading Jaakko Rinne
The people in the videos are Juha Pulli, Mirva Anjala, Juska Jutila, Ville Oinonen, Samuli Laine and Jaakko Pyykkölä.
The exhibition has been supported by the Arts Promotion Centre Finland and the National Council for Media Art, Comics and Illustration.
Contact details:
Marjo Viitala
+358 40 510 8201
marjoh.viitala(at)gmail.com
marjoviitala.wordpress.com
