Charles Atlas: Screening and Artist Talk: September 19

Electronic Arts Intermix
535 West 22nd Street, 5th Floor
6:30pm

Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI) proudly presents a screening of the work of acclaimed video artist Charles Atlas, followed by an in-depth artist talk. The recently restored Hail the New Puritan (1985-86, 85 min.), Atlas' groundbreaking collaboration with choreographer Michael Clark, will be screened, along with excerpts from his recent Instant Fame installation series and his live collaborations with Fennesz and Antony and the Johnsons. Atlas will discuss his work and take questions from the audience.

Hail the New Puritan feels as fresh and audacious today as it did more than two decades ago when first released. A mesmerizing blend of dance, music, drama and "mockumentary," it engagingly presents the prodigiously talented Clark as choreographer, dancer, celebrity, lover and nightclubber. It portrays the vitality of London's mid-'80s underground scene in the face of economic turmoil and political division, through the lens of athletic, post-modern dance.

Atlas has collaborated live with many eminent performers. In Turning, his recent partnership with celebrated singer Antony, he captured and processed images of thirteen "beauties" as they literally turned on a podium onstage, projecting their refashioned images onto a large screen. Atlas' video intensified Antony's intimate investigations of image, identity and metamorphosis.

In his collaboration with Austrian electronic music composer and performer Fennesz, Atlas processed visual samples live, while Fennesz played guitar and manipulated appropriated sounds. In dialogue with the composer's moody, atmospheric music, Atlas' poignant collages were a dramatic mix of found film footage and video clips.

Altas also used live mixing in his recent video installation Instant Fame. In a Warholian celebration of exhibitionism, he set up a studio in a gallery and shot footage of anyone who wanted to be videotaped: they could perform or simply sit for the camera. The images were reworked in real time and simultaneously projected in an adjacent exhibition space. When Atlas was not in the gallery, a compilation of the performances was screened. With no script or scenario to work with, and usually no prior relationship to his subjects, he pushed the boundaries of collaboration to its limits.

Free Admission.

http://www.eai.org/eai/09_07_atlas_pr.html