I REPEAT MYSELF WHEN UNDER STRESS
I Repeat Myself When Under Stress examines the ways that contemporary artists compulsively duplicate visual, narrative and formal elements in their work. Repetition and reproduction have been recurrent themes in artistic practice since 1945—as a means of embracing medium hybridity and as a stylistic device—revealing both the compulsions of consumption and the psychological constraints artists face in climates of economic and political uncertainty.
PAST EXHIBITIONS
I REPEAT MYSELF WHEN UNDER STRESS
FEBRUARY 13 – MAY 3, 2009
I Repeat Myself When Under Stress examines the ways that contemporary artists compulsively duplicate visual, narrative and formal elements in their work. Repetition and reproduction have been recurrent themes in artistic practice since 1945—as a means of embracing medium hybridity and as a stylistic device—revealing both the compulsions of consumption and the psychological constraints artists face in climates of economic and political uncertainty.
In the exhibition, Ceal Floyer, known for her extremely precise and subtle interventions in exhibition spaces, presents already existing works. Hans Schabus has created a site-specific installation on a simultaneously micro- and mega-scale, and Tris Vonna-Michell has expanded a work created in response to his encounters with the social history and revolutionary potential of the City of Detroit.
The artists, both individually and collectively, reflect and focus on repetition, a concept that acquires special significance in the context of Detroit—the city where the assembly line was invented. Once a great symbol of modernity and automatization, this industrial process relied on an inherent linearity and repetitiveness that over time has, without significant adaptations, become virtually obsolete, particularly in an increasingly interconnected world.
Curated by Trevor Smith, Curator of Contemporary Art, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts, and Thomas Trummer, Project Manager for the Visual Arts at Siemens Arts Program, Munich, I Repeat Myself When Under Stress is presented in collaboration with the Siemens Arts Program.
