Photo: Courtesy of Ryan Trecartin on Vimeo.
Here's a lovely and mind-melting video to play out the weekend. It comes from artist Ryan Trecartin, whose work is not exactly easy to categorize. Art in America declared recently, "There is nothing else in today's art world even remotely like Ryan Trecartin's videos." And, while that is certainly true, there are at least common elements within his work: nightmarish makeup, ghoulish drag, vocal fry, psychedelic editing, the accoutrements of suburban life, and a jabberwocky of corporate jargon and Internet neologisms spoken through a Chipmunks filter. It's a complex soup of information overload that could only exist in the age of Twitter and TED Talks. If you saw his sprawling show at PS1 in Queens or LA's MOCA a few years back, you know what we mean.
In his latest video, "Center Jenny" — posted back in September, but helpfully brought to our attention by ArtFCity — there is no overt plot to speak of, but it follows a typically Trecartian trajectory: Imagine Mean Girls and motivational posters stuffed into a blender full of mescaline. His characters speak in empty platitudes ("We gotta learn to walk backwards if we're gonna fly") and faux new ageisms tinged with techno-speak. ("Uh, we're about to use nano-magic? You should stand.") It's at once disorienting and familiar.
We can't embed the video here, but you can check it out on Trecartin's Vimeo page. Enjoy the ride. (ArtFCity)