John Kelsey
19 January 2013 -
30 March 2013

opening reception on Saturday,
19 January, 7-9 pm

EN
DE

John Kelsey

 

19. Januar - 30. März 2013
Eröffnung am Samstag, dem 19. Januar von 19-21 Uhr

 

Während unseres alljährlichen Sommerurlaubs auf Cape Cod malte der kreativere Teil meiner Familie Aquarelle. Die Aquarellmalerei gehörte wie Bootfahren zu den Standardaktivitäten und diente nicht zuletzt dazu, uns gegenseitig aus dem Weg zu gehen. Jene kleinen, sparsamen, ernsten, freudlosen protestantischen Landschaften entsprachen meiner ersten, falschen Vorstellung von Kunst.

 

In der hier gezeigten neuen Serie von Landschaften mit Datenzentren wird der Eindruck des Pastoralen zuweilen durch Hubschrauber- und Satellitenansichten verstärkt. Die von Unternehmen wie Apple, Google und Facebook (aber auch vom Staat) betriebenen Datenzentren sind die physische Realität hinter dem Mythos der immateriellen Produktion und der Wissensökonomie, die eigentlichen Orte, an denen unsere Daten landen, wenn wir sie in „die Cloud“ laden. Es handelt sich hierbei um jene gewaltigen gekühlten Hochsicherheits-„Serverfarmen“ und -„Datenscheunen“, in denen sämtliche Informationen, die wir beim Arbeiten und Socializing in irgendwelchen Netzwerken hinterlassen, gespeichert und verarbeitet werden, auch diejenigen Daten, die wir nicht mehr nutzen oder an die wir uns nicht mehr erinnern können. Vereinzelt zeigen Innenansichten die „Kaltgänge“ solcher Großrechner von oben.

 

Einige der vorliegenden Arbeiten entstanden tatsächlich vor Ort auf Cape Cod: Please respect my decision to end this long-distance relationship because it is not working for me sowie I do not want to talk to you or see you - beide Porträts habe ich im vergangenen Sommer nach der Natur gemalt. Andere abstrakte Bilder entstanden, indem ich um zufällig verstreute Münzen herummalte. Daneben zeige ich drei „Namens-Bilder“: Rosamund Blazek, Faustine Honts und Mavis Maung - die unheimlichen und irgendwie unecht klingenden Absender von Spam-E-Mails, in denen für Preisnachlässe auf Arzneimittel gegen Erektionsstörungen und Depressionen geworben wird. Die Aquarelle wurden wie Fotoabzüge auf Acrylglas und Aluminium aufgezogen und, um einen unmittelbareren Zugang zu ihrer wässrig-zarten Beschaffenheit zu ermöglichen, glaslos gerahmt.

 

Die drei Texte innerhalb der Ausstellung setzen sich ausschließlich aus Inhalten der von Blazek, Honts und anderen versendeten Massen-E-Mails zusammen. Nicht selten werden in solche Mails willkürlich ausgewählte Literaturfragmente eingefügt, die wohl wie die verwendeten Eigennamen dazu dienen, mögliche Spamfilter zu umgehen. Hierbei wird der frakturierte Text in gedichtartiger Gestalt neu angeordnet - zu Halluzinationen eines potenziellen literarischen Raums innerhalb des post-literarischen Raums der Cyber-Kommunikation. Die Fotos in diesen Kompositionen habe ich mit meinem Handy aufgenommen und anschließend mit Instagram bearbeitet.

 

J.K.

 

John Kelsey (*1964, lebt in New York) ist Schreiber, Galerist und Mitglied der Künstlerkollektive Bernadette Corporation und Reena Spaulings. Wir freuen uns mit dieser Ausstellung die erste Einzelausstellung John Kelseys als Künstler unter seinem Namen ankündigen zu dürfen.

John Kelsey

 

19 January - 30 March 2013
opening reception on Saturday, 19 January, 7-9 pm

 

Watercolors are what the creative ones in the family did while summering on Cape Cod. It was a default activity, like boating, and another way of avoiding each other by the sea. Those small, thrifty, earnest, joyless, protestant landscapes were my first, wrong idea of art.

 

In this new series of landscapes with data centers, a pastoral feeling is sometimes assisted by helicopter and satellite views. Owned and operated by companies like Apple, Google and Facebook (also by the government), data centers are the physical reality behind the myth of immaterial production and the knowledge economy, the actual places where information goes when we send it to “the cloud.” These are the massive, refrigerated, high security “server farms” and “data barns” that store and process everything we do when we work and socialize via networks, including information we no longer use or remember. Occasional interior views gaze down “cold aisles” of data processors.

 

Some works actually were painted on Cape Cod: Please respect my decision to end this long-distance relationship because it is not working for me and I do not want to talk to you or see you - both portraits painted from life last summer. Other abstractions were made by painting around randomly scattered coins. And there are three paintings of names: Rosamund Blazek, Faustine Honts and Mavis Maung - the uncanny, not quite real sounding senders of spam emails advertising discount pharmaceuticals for erectile dysfunction and depression. The watercolors are mounted flat like photo prints on sheets of plexiglas and aluminum, and framed without glass for a more direct encounter with their watery, sensitive qualities.

 

Three texts are composed using only the content of mass emails sent by Blazek, Honts and others. Random fragments of appropriated literature are often copied and pasted into such messages, and like the names are probably means of evading spam filters. Here the fractured writing is reorganized in poem-like forms - hallucinations of a potential literary space within the post-literary space of cyber-communication. The images in these compositions are my own cell phone photos, processed through Instagram.

 

J.K.

 

John Kelsey (*1964, lives in New York) is a writer, gallery director, and member of the artists’ collectives Bernadette Corporation and Reena Spaulings. We are happy to announce the first solo exhibition of John Kelsey as an artist under his own name.

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

Processor I.+II.”, 2013
two watercolors, mounted on plexi
each 18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Processor III.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Cold Aisles”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“Safeco Data Center, Redmond, WA”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
23 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“Thank you I”, 2013
UV direct print on vinyl, aluminum, foam core
200 x 100 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, The Dalles, OR IV.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Server Farm”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, The Dalles, OR II.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, The Dalles, OR II.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Rosamund Blazek”, 2013 watercolor, mounted on sintra
41 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Lulea, Sweden”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Apple Data Center, Maiden, NC IV.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Apple Data Center, Maiden, NC II.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Fascinator”, 2013
UV direct print on magnetic vinyl
236 x 140 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Rutherford County, NC IV.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Rutherford County, NC III.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Rutherford County, NC I.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
23 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Rutherford County, NC II.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi 31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Rutherford County, NC VI.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Rutherford County, NC V. / Google Data Center, The Netherlands II.”, 2013
two watercolors, mounted on plexi each 18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“They escaped II.”, 2013
UV direct print on vinyl, aluminum
200 x 100 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“Apple Data Center, Maiden, NC I.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
23 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, Douglas County, GA”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Faustine Honts”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on sintra
41 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

“VMWare Data Center, Wenatchee, WA”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminium
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“I Do Not Want to Talk to You or See You”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
38 x 25,4 cm

John Kelsey

“Apple Data Center, Maiden, NC III”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“Data Center II.”, 2013
pencil, watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Please Respect My Decision to End this Long Distance Relationship Because It Is Not Working for Me”, 2013
tobacco ashes, watercolor, mounted on plexi
50,7 x 38,1 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Prineville, OR I.”, 2013
tobacco ashes, watercolor, mounted on plexi
23 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“They escaped II.”, 2013
UV direct print on foam core
200 x 100 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, The Dalles, OR III.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Facebook Data Center, Prineville, OR II.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“NSA Data Center, Camp Williams, UT”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
31 x 41 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, Hamina, Finland”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

installation view Galerie Buchholz, Köln 2013

John Kelsey

“Data Center I.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Akiba Yerganian, Mavis Maung”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on sintra
41 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

“Google”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, Lenoir, NC”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
23 x 31 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, Goose Creek, SC”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Google Data Center, St. Ghislain, Belgium II.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on aluminum
18 x 26 cm

John Kelsey

“Foreign Coins II.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
26 x 18 cm

John Kelsey

“Foreign Coins III.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
26 x 18 cm

John Kelsey

“Foreign Coins IV.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
26 x 18 cm

John Kelsey

“Foreign Coins I.”, 2013
watercolor, mounted on plexi
41 x 31 cm