A pair of feminine urban icons act as symbols of two cities in The Light Factory’s latest exhibition, the multimedia installation The Topography of Desire: Urban Identities — Charlotte — Berlin.
Charlotte and Berlin. An element of mischief pervades the spaces in this tale of two cities, which feel as capricious as a precocious child’s playroom, wayward and non-hierarchical in its presentation of parts.
Charlotte artist Jacqueline Heer lays claim to Raymond Kaskey’s painful expression of Queen Charlotte at the airport to represent our city; and to the tall “Victory Column” known as Siegessaule to symbolize the capital of Germany. Nicknamed “Gold-Else,” Berlin’s Winged Victory, perching high atop a column, is magnificent. Elevated to this status back in the 1930s by Hitler, the maiden of Siegessaule can be seen soaring high in certain films by Wim Wenders.
Of course, Charlotte has very little in common with the older city of Berlin. We wouldn’t think of comparing ourselves with Vienna, or Paris. Dallas, maybe, or Atlanta, but Berlin? Nevertheless, The Light Factory provides the opportunity and Charlotte artist Jacqueline Heer chooses her elements with alacrity.
Along with the feminine “familiars,” the folksy character Pinocchio, in various guises, also appears throughout this visual excursion inside the mind of the artist — but we’re not sure why.
Heer assembles found objects like a bricoleur, collecting and reassembling fragments to integrate with photography — curls of metal, doll parts, a bit of artificial landscape, a tiny toy train set, and consciously appropriated commercial imagery all combine to create an exhibition that’s often undecipherable.
Photography plays the major role. Color photos of small objects — floating, flying figurines of porcelain and cast metal toys — blown up to huge scale, together with snaps of Kaskey’s Queen Charlotte, wrap the walls in hybrid images that are disturbing, at times nightmarish.
A pair of “Crowns,” set upon plinths, provide 3-D interest. One is constructed of glass forks! Two old-fashioned washtubs on display in the center of the room are filled to their brims with shrink-wrapped doll parts, presented like supermarket chicken parts. Is Heer drawing a connection here? “We are what we eat”?
The strange, random progression through the gallery leads ultimately to a curtained room with two projectors. Like many contemporary venues, Heer provides a “video booth.” Pinocchio and a smudged Queen whirl and float across the smaller screen in a fancy concoction of dancing bright light. The larger video, also like a home movie, is slightly more straightforward. A man, a “City Slicker,” sometimes with a Pinocchio nose or hat affixed, along with a woman dressed as a fairy-tale princess or queen, devolve into players in a yarn of another sort. The activities of these actors imply a concealed narrative. Do the occasional German words, softly spoken in a female voice, give us clues?
The City Slicker boards a bus signposted for Potsdamer Platz. In the next shot, he’s Pinocchio. Is he headed for the Potsdamer Platz of the present? Of Helmet Jahn and Renzo Piano? Or of the Wasteland around the Wall? Or perhaps to the prewar Platz, when the urban node was the epicenter of Berlin’s night life.
The “straight” video cuts to a sky view of “Gold-Else,” framed by tall street lamps, hovering like an angel 223 feet above Berlin. The camera pulls back to reveal the young man — Pinocchio or the City Slicker — running around and around the circular temple at the base of Siegessaule. As the camera appears to circle this tempietto, the architectural base itself seems to rotate. The angel, the words on the base of the statue; the words spoken in German. All
very mysterious.
The video is vaguely interesting, but I wonder if every multi-media installation in the western world must include the Sound and the Fury of video?
What about live performance? Something to spice up the tired old video wars?
And what’s it all mean? Where does Typography of Desire take us? What do we learn about the two cities?
Heer says, “Like samples collected from the soil… [the exhibition] measures their content, and offers the findings for interpretation.”
Meaning, therefore, is up to the viewer.
There is danger in pushing the edges of art too far — over the edge, into the graveyard of art that fails. Meaning may be blurred intentionally, but willful obfuscation can imply an artist is hiding behind a shield of inscrutability.
When art is too hard to interpret, viewers seek vestiges of the familiar. And there is refuge to be found within satire. Good satire is about a familiar subject. But I couldn’t tell if Heer’s installation is consciously satirical, a pun, or a mockery.
If we have to work too hard, we simply give up.
Despite this obfuscation, parts of the installation are fun to look at. The video images, and the destination signs — Potsdamer Platz, the Winter Garten, the street lights and the marquees — illuminate the romance of urban streets at night, and invite narrative interpretations of everyday city life.
As is usual with the art of Jacqueline Heer, an enigmatic blend of art, color and serious play combines the obscure and the clear-cut. Whether the artist succeeds in her quest to “…distill some essence from a vast and complex territory of conditions,” or merely attempts to do so, is up to you, the viewer, to decide.
A Note About The Light Factory: It’s no reflection on the gallery that finding, and keeping, the right director is proving to be a difficult work-in-progress. It’s just one of those things. Charlotte’s center for photographic art is again experiencing upheaval in its staff, with four of its five permanent staff members turning in resignations for a combination of personal reasons. But TLF appears to be withstanding the blow — just. One can hope the organization isn’t in real jeopardy.
“Don’t worry,” said one long-time member. “This won’t be the last weird show at The Light Factory.” Thank goodness! You can enjoy this rare taste of the avant-garde in The Queen City until June 15. The more traditional Members’ Show opens June 22. *
This article appears in Jun 12-18, 2002.
