opacity
Olivia Lory Kay
June 9 - June 20
Visually
and aurally rich with information, Olivia Lory Kay's installation opacity
encourages us to seek out local stories amid the hype of of the homogenising
global media, to map new ways to live in an image saturated world. 'Sampling'
from both local and distant environments, Lory Kay has created a series
of stories or vignettes that are are told using sound and moving image.
In her densely layered installation the world is seen through the multi-faceted
lens of the video camera, bounced and refracted by the hanging mirrors,
glass, and water until it takes on an otherworldly translucency. Combining
footage sourced in Rome, Berlin Sydney and New York with images of Christchurch
seen from the windows and roof of The Physics Room, opacity implodes
our sense of space and time, generating within the confines of the gallery
a new mythical cityscape that is at once strange and familiar: the dizzying
view from a train coursing it's way through a foreign city; a panoramic
view of the Christchurch skyline; a screaming car alarm recorded on
the street outside; an animalistic roar like the sound of a rising storm.
By subjecting us to a dizzying abundance of shared images and experiences,
opacity foregrounds the importance of conserving the imaginary
in an age when the tools of mass communication create their own architecture
and sense of the Real.
|