Stacked together and leaned against the wall, identical panes of safety glass seem to have been the recipient of a blow in this state, shattered ripple tracing the energy’s transference. The press release reveals that this glass is cut in the same ratio as the standard for 35mm movie film, a similarly impressionable medium. This is the work of Eli Ping, currently on view at Susan Inglett Gallery.
Joining this work in the selectively installed exhibition is a long format video depicting the artist walking the length of Manhattan on Broadway while making a concerted effort never to place his foot on a line. This conceptually pregnant linear motif happens twice more in the exhibition.
The first example confronts the viewer immediately in the form of a floor to ceiling pillar constructed of an aluminum I-beam cut into equal sections and re-stacked in such a way as to lock together. The result creates an ordered but semi-precarious alignment of elements conceivably once composing a single rigid architectural bone. The second linear element is on black enamel reverse-painted glass laid on the floor to create a threshold which must be crossed over in order to experience the rest of the work.
The show is economic in it’s expressive elements while employing largely communicable aesthetic themes of serious conceptual weight. Go see it.
IMAGE:Syncopated Descent, 2013. Video, 4:36 hours. Edition of 3.
