Tuesday, May 22, 2007

buz-co


Welcome to my blog, - hope your holiday was good


This was the invite to my recent show 'Prelude To Bitterness', which is up until 9 June and can be viewed in Salt River Cape Town, see map below.

Intro - Prelude to Bitterness consists of new video and print works by Charles Maggs. In the work Maggs explores distortions thrown up by the convenience society in which we all operate. Much as a disease manifests itself in a series of sometimes unrelated symptoms, the distortions that trigger the work manifest themselves in a series of states such as dislocation, detachment from time and space, logic interruptions and unexplained paranoia.

Here are some images from this show.

This is from 'Lis'


This still is from 'Spacial'

More Detail
‘Prelude to Bitterness’ extends some of the thoughts showcased in my previous body of work ‘Cirque du Pan’, focusing particularly on some of the distortions thrown up by the convenience society in which we all partake. At the centre is an exploration of effects that are incidental to those complex organised human systems which exist as part of our supermodern lives. While the work interrogates these systems in its own manner, it ultimately delights in the distortions they throw up.

The ‘Bitterness’ of the title refers not to disappointment, but rather to bitterness as one of the four primary taste sensations, and specifically to those bitter things for which we acquire a taste and which we learn to love as part of our supercharged lifestyles. These bitter things are often the rewards we grant ourselves for enduring our daily lives. Bitterness thus becomes an expectation, a state of mind, an acquired feeling, something complex, and something to consider and savour. Acquiring a taste for bitterness confirms our ability as humans to adapt to any number of circumstances.

The works on this show explore states thrown up by our relentless quest for convenience, states such as dislocation, detachment from the 'simulation' of the real, or a loss of spatial references when that which we understand to be our space becomes unrecognisable, unreal, unstable and unfamiliar - what Marc Auge refers to as ‘non-spaces’.


Before this I showed a body of work called Cirque du Pan/Panic Circuit At the AVA in Church street Cape Town.


These are stills from my video piece 'Right'