THE DYING OF THE LIGHT: FILM AS MEDIUM AND METAPHOR
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NEWS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
25 February 2014
Contact: Jodi Joseph
Director of Communications
413.664.4481 x8113
jjoseph@massmoca.org
THE DYING OF THE LIGHT:
FILM AS MEDIUM AND METAPHOR
Museum Showcases Six Artists Working in Film in a Love Letter to Celluloid
North Adams, Massachusetts –
With the rapid disappearance of
photochemical film, many visual
artists stand out among the group
of dedicated filmmakers who
choose to use light-sensitive film
rather than digital formats.
Museums and galleries thus
become a critical part of efforts to
preserve a technology and
discipline that is beginning to fade. The Dying of the Light: Film as Medium and Metaphor features the
work of 6 artists – Rosa Barba, Matthew Buckingham, Tacita Dean, Rodney Graham, Lisa Oppenheim,
and Simon Starling – who capitalize on film’s particular visual, material, aural, and even metaphoric
characteristics. Film’s associations with light, motion, perception, time – and now obsolescence – are
among the themes evident in the MASS MoCA exhibition, as is the history of film and its close
relationship to the technological advances of the last century and a half. A mix of atmospheric,
documentary, and sculptural works, the ensemble of works in the exhibition speak to the past and the
future, vision, technology, beauty, faith, and even death. The Dying of the Light is on view beginning
March 29, 2014, when an opening reception will celebrate the exhibition.
In The Green Ray (2001), Tacita Dean focuses on the setting sun, hoping to witness the moment in
which the atmosphere refracts the light and causes a flash of green. The optical phenomena – well
known to those who spend their days at sea, though visible only under certain conditions, has achieved
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mythic status, and has come to be seen as a harbinger of great change. Shooting in a remote location
in Madagascar, Dean not only successfully documented the rare phenomenon on celluloid film, but
succeeded where others – recording in digital – failed to register the elusive green ray.
Rodney Graham’s Torqued Chandelier Release (2005) conflates his memory of a scene of a falling
chandelier in the 1952 film “Scaramouche” and Sir Isaac Newton’s famous bucket experiment
demonstrating the properties of rotational motion. A chandelier on a twisted rope is let loose and filmed
on high-speed film as it spins first in one direction and then its reverse. In this seemingly simple study of
light and movement, Graham captures the essence of the moving image and its magic.
Lisa Oppenheim’s Yule Log (2009) takes the New York City television tradition of broadcasting a
Christmas hearth as its starting point. Oppenheim printed the image on film 28 times, one frame for
every year of broadcast. Each iteration is one generation further removed from the original,
transforming a clear likeness to a painterly play of light and shadow, and becoming a visual
representation of the disintegration of memory. Oppenheim’s fire naturally leads to Smoke (2011-13),
the title of her second work in the exhibition. On two imposing screens, the artist projects images of
smoke she found online. Oppenheim converts web-sourced smoke clips into 35 mm film, then makes
contact prints which she exposes and solarizes with fire. Scanned and strung together as an animation,
the images are a rich hybrid of analog and digital.
Filmed from a helicopter, Rosa Barba’s 35mm film The Long Road (2010 – titled after the poem by
Robert Creeley which is part of its soundtrack – circles above an abandoned race car track in the
California desert. Referencing large Land Art works, the film is projected here on a theater-size screen
bisecting the large central gallery on the museum’s second floor. The revolving image recalls the
looping of the film itself and emphasizes the significance of time on both human and geological scales
and in both film and sculpture. A second and stunning sculptural work in the midst of oversize screens
and screening rooms, Stating the Real Sublime (2009), emphasizes the connection between the two
mediums. Held only by the film rotating through its body, a functional projector floats in the gallery,
projecting a simple white light through the film that is its own support, an image of possibility on which
dust, scratches, and other traces of time slowly build.
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Five years before the Lumiere Brothers debuted their first film, Louis Le Prince had developed a
functional motion picture system. Yet when the little-known inventor mysteriously vanished from a train
between Paris and Dijon in 1890, he changed the course of the medium’s history and future. In False
Future (2007), Matthew Buckingham restages a static shot from one of Le Prince’s four films and
projects it in 16mm onto a cloth; the installation echoes accounts of Le Prince’s workroom. A voice-
over in French speculates on Le Prince’s life.
While making Black Drop (2012) Simon Starling documents the 2012 transit of Venus across the sun -
in what the work proposes might be the last time it will be captured on celluloid (the next transit is in
2117). The narrative unfolds as the film shows an editor in a 35mm editing booth trying to make sense
of archival footage and Starling’s own footage of the 2012 transit. The work examines the connection
between the history of photography and moving image technology and advances in astronomical
observation.
Given the challenges of projecting film in a gallery setting, where films are looped continuously instead
of screened at specific times, leaving equipment susceptible to break and malfunction, the exhibition
will be framed as an opportunity to share with visitors a behind-the-scenes look at the care of these
mediums and the need for its preservation. Just as the artists leave the projectors in full view – a central
component of their installations – The Dying of the Light will share the rituals of maintenance and repair
that are required to keep the projections running.
Sponsorship
This exhibition is supported by the Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation and the Massachusetts Cultural
Council.
About the Artists
Rosa Barba (b. 1972, Sicily) approaches film in a way that is more sculptural than it is filmic; she often
utilizes the mechanisms of the medium’s display – projectors, light, celluloid film itself – as sculptural
material, creating work that transcends the traditional space of the screen. Barba exhibits widely
internationally. She was recently included in Performa, New York, and in 2013 was in residence at the
MASS MoCA 1040 MASS MoCA WAY NORTH ADAMS, MASSACHUSETTS 01247
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Chinati Foundation, Marfa, Texas, and Artpace, San Antonio. She is represented by Gio’ Marconi,
Milan. She lives and works in Berlin.
Matthew Buckingham (b. 1963, Nevada, Iowa) utilizes narrative, fiction, and history in his films to
reframe the viewers’ experience and understanding of the past. His work has been exhibited widely in
distinguished institutions, including the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid; The
Brooklyn Museum; and the Art Institute of Chicago; and can be found in the collections of Tate
Modern, London; and the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum, New York; among
others. Buckingham is represented by Murray Guy, New York. He currently lives in New York.
The preeminent artist working in film today, Tacita Dean (b. 1965, Canterbury, England) is known for
her lyrical, meditative narratives which often reverberate with themes of time and memory. Her
monumental, 2011 installation FILM at the Tate’s Turbine Hall garnered her international attention and
provided a platform for her efforts to preserve her medium. She is represented by Frith Street Gallery,
London, and Marian Goodman Gallery, New York. Dean currently lives in Berlin.
For Canadian artist Rodney Graham (b. 1949, Abbotsford, British Columbia), the medium of film is
only one element of a much larger practice which incorporates photography, performance, video,
music, writing, and painting. His work has been shown in institutions all over the world, and in 2011
he was awarded the Audain Prize for lifetime achievement in visual arts, British Columbia. He is
currently represented by Hauser & Wirth, Zurich; 303 Gallery, New York; Donald Young Gallery,
Chicago; and Lisson Gallery, London. Graham lives and works in Vancouver.
Lisa Oppenheim (b. 1975, New York) melds digital and analogue processes to create her film,
engaging contemporary modes of image-making and replication, while retaining the qualities of early
experimental film. Her work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art and the Solomon R.
Guggenheim Museum, New York, among others. She is represented by The Approach, London, and
Galerie Juliette Jongma, Amsterdam. Oppenheim lives and works in New York.
In both his sculpture and his films, Simon Starling (b. 1967, Epsom, England) combines historical
research with an interest in materials to tell the complex stories behind the subjects of his inquiries. In
MASS MoCA 1040 MASS MoCA WAY NORTH ADAMS, MASSACHUSETTS 01247
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2005 he was awarded the prestigious Turner Prize. He has been the subject of solo exhibitions at
numerous international museums and created a major installation for MASS MoCA’s signature gallery
in 2008. Starling lives and works in Copenhagen and is represented by The Modern Institute, London;
neugerriemschneider, Berlin; and Casey Kaplan Gallery, New York.
About MASS MoCA
MASS MoCA is one of the world's liveliest (and largest!) centers for making and enjoying the best new
art of our time, across all media: music, art, dance, theater, film, and video. Hundreds of works of
visual and performing art have been created on its 19th-century factory campus during fabrication and
rehearsal residencies in North Adams, making MASS MoCA among the most productive sites in the
country for the creation and presentation of new art. More platform than box, MASS MoCA strives to
bring to its audiences art and shared learning experiences that are fresh, engaging, and
transformative.
MASS MoCA's galleries are open 11am to 5pm every day except Tuesdays. In July and August, MASS
MoCA's galleries are open 10am to 6pm every day. Gallery hours are often extended on
evenings featuring performing arts events. Gallery admission is $15 for adults, $10 for students, $5 for
children 6 to 16, and free for children 5 and under. Members are admitted free year-round. For
additional information, call 413.662.2111 x1 or visit massmoca.org.
Contact
Jodi Joseph, Director of Communications
413.664.4481 x8113
jjoseph@massmoca.org
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