Traps and Transmutations, 3
Bortolami
The Upstairs: Transmutations
Sascha Braunig, Jules Gimbrone, Piero Golia, Brook Hsu, Anicka Yi
1 May – 12 June 2021
Opening Saturday, 1 May from 11am-6pm

Jules Gimbrone’s Traps and Transmutations 3, 2021, is a resonating stage composed through a cosmology of vibrating actants and actors. The traps come in the appearance of static forms, recording mechanisms and quantifiable technologies. The transmutations are catalyzed by all of the forces pushing away from, cutting, degrading and liberating these forms. Sound, a form of energy transfer, literally pushes through the forms: knives, cast soap, microphones cast in resin, and desiccated cabbage. These forms are cast into vibratory ecstasy through a composition of audio including the artist’s breath blowing up a balloon, the recording of the motor of a fan, and a series of feedback exercises with the stage. The most explicit symbol of the body, a 5 ft resonating glass vessel is filled with salt water and other organic detritus is animated by the artist’s voice chanting the phrase “concave, convex” as a sort of transubstantiatory ritual.

At what point is a vibrating sack of molecules legible as an object? What makes it so and what are the forces that act upon it to assist or degrade this legibility? Is the convex curve of a hip enough to signify a gender? At what point does that curve become a symbol? Can we chart the precise moment of categorization? What are the possibilities if we can’t?