If you have to see one exhibition in London…
Let it be whiteonwhite:algorithmicthriller at Haunch of Venison. Bonus! You can then climb up the stairs and see Places,strange and quiet, some 40 large-scale and spectacular photos that filmmaker Wim Wenders shot between 1983 and 2011.
Eve Sussman | Rufus Corporation, whiteonwhite:algorithmicthriller, 2011
Eve Sussman | Rufus Corporation, whiteonwhite:algorithmicthriller, 2011
The exhibition by artist Eve Sussman and Rufus Corporation centers around whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir a thriller/scifi movie that follows a geophysicist code writer stuck in a futuristic, cold and unwelcoming city.
If you’re afraid of experimental fiction (i know i am), this film should win you over. whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir runs endlessly, editing live in real time, with no beginning, middle or end, never repeating the same way twice. The movie is so extraordinarily beautiful and puzzling that i will go back and see it today, tomorrow again and probably over the weekend as well.
A level of control is granted to a computer software that edits the film in real time, live as you are sitting in the screening room. The machine culls scenes from a server loaded with 2637 video clips, creating suspense through unexpected juxtapositions. The implied narrative is communicated through voiceovers, wire tapped telephone conversations and snippets of a job interview between Mr. Holz and his prospective employer, Mr. White. It becomes evident that the character is controlled by a city and the code he is working on, as the course of the story is controlled by the code that edits the film.
Eve Sussman | Rufus Corporation, whiteonwhite:algorithmicthriller, 2011
Eve Sussman | Rufus Corporation, whiteonwhite:algorithmicthriller, 2011
Eve Sussman | Rufus Corporation, whiteonwhite:algorithmicthriller, 2011
whiteonwhite:algorithmicnoir was created on an “expedition to unravel utopian promise” with a small crew, one American actor and local actors hired en route. The fictional location is named – in a nod to Godard’s 1965 science fiction film Alphaville – City-A. The place is a fusion of many places (mostly Soviet era (dys)utopian cities) encountered during the artists’ journey in European Eastern countries.
Carousel (Photos for “White on White”), 2009
Simon Lee from the series Shadow Over the Land for Eve Sussman | Rufus Corporation, whiteonwhite, Orange Factory, 2009
This improvised film noir is accompanied by where the future throws a shadow over the land, a series of photographs shot by Simon Lee during production of whiteonwhite. These photos exemplify the idea of ‘archival footage from the future’ and contain a sense of time speeding by, as the impending future – implied through a contradictory metaphor of darkness as the past blows out to white – throws a shadow over the land.
whiteonwhite:algorithmicthriller remains open at Haunch of Venison until 14 May 2011.