Page 182 - The 60.Venice Biennial & MoMA issue of WOA Contemporary Art magazine

Presented both in the galleries and on a special online
WORLD-CLASS ART experience video art’s varied viewing conditions, sites
channel on moma.org, Signals will enable audiences to

of display, and geographic reach, from closed-circuit
experiments to viral video, from agitation to persuasion, from
forensic evidence to alternative facts. The exhibition will show
how artists use video to probe society, communication, and
democracy.
Many of the works on view will be large-scale installations
whose examination of contested landscapes and territories
parallel their experimental and immersive approach to the
exhibition space. Notably, Stan VanDerBeek’s Movie Drome
(1965), an “experience machine” conceived as a prototype for
Amar Kanwar. The Torn First Pages (still from The Face). 2004–2008. Nineteen-channel
standard-definition video (black and white and color, sound and silent; varying a global telecommunications system, was recently acquired
durations), nineteen sheets of paper, three metal frames, books, magazines, and by the Museum and will be reconstructed at full scale for the
artist books. Dimensions variable. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Acquired first time.
through the generosity of The Estate of Byron R. Meyer, Kiran Nadar, and The
Contemporary Arts Council. © 2022 Amar Kanwar
Additionally, the exhibition will include recent works such as
Sondra Perry’s Double Quadruple Etcetera Etcetera (2013),
Stuart Comer added, “Many of the works in the exhibition have
which explores a contemporary scenario in which interactivity,
been recently acquired and never before seen at MoMA, while
visibility, and liveness is the norm, but in which all too many
others demonstrate the Museum’s groundbreaking engagement
bodies have nevertheless been violently suppressed, policed,
with video from the 1960s on. While video is now a pervasive
and erased.
and defining aspect of contemporary life, it is an unruly and
elusive artform that has created institutional challenges
Major funding is provided by The International Council of The
since its inception. Signals marks almost 50 years since the
Museum of Modern Art, the Wallis Annenberg Director's Fund
groundbreaking gathering ‘Open Circuits: An Int'l Conference
for Innovation in Contemporary Art, and the Thomas H. Lee
on the Future of Television’ took place at MoMA in 1974,
and Ann Tenenbaum Endowed Fund. Major contributions
helping to catalyze a community of artists, curators and critics,
to the Annual Exhibition Fund are provided by Emily Rauh
to champion the medium. Since that time, the Museum has
Pulitzer, The Sundheim Family Foundation, and Karen and
continued to collect and preserve video in its many forms and
Gary Winnick. Major support for the publication is provided
today holds one of the largest int'l media collections. Signals,
by The Museum of Modern Art’s Research and Scholarly
primarily drawn from MoMA’s collection, traces the history of
Publications endowment.
an art form that has never been bound completely within the
Museum’s walls, one that has been directly connected to the
social and political pulse of the last half century.”
Dana Kavelina. Letter to a Turtledove. 2020. High-definition video (color, sound). 20:55
min. Courtesy the artist and Fridman Gallery. © 2022 Dana Kavelina

Nam June Paik. Good Morning Mr. Orwell. 1984. Video (color, sound). 38 minutes.
The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Gift of the artist. © 2022 Estate of Nam June
Paik. Courtesy Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI), New York

182 WORLD of ART