Surface Tension_Los Angeles

The exhibition focuses around questions pertaining to the built environment, with a specific focus on Los Angeles. Following the question - What remains of a building divided into equal parts and distributed for reconfiguration? - participating artists will explore the role architecture plays in defining relationships in the city: How does the particular architectural environment of LA contribute to forms of social exchange? What local historical forces have led to the conditions of the built and how do such histories continue to position or locate the body? What architectural tensions might be teased out to initiate dialogue across the urban fabric? Forms of spatial intervention, imaginary building projects, and appropriations and poetic modifications to the built environment will feature as methods for developing sited inquiry. From such a perspective, participating artists will question existing patterns of the built environment within Los Angeles while seeking to occupy, through forms of performance and intervention, the sites of examination.

Carmen Argote How to Mime the Kitchen

The work focuses on the notion of a memorized site, specifically with the idea of muscle memory, by working with some of the ideas behind the process of mime. The notion of muscle memory and the act of a repeated action creating a physical and mental imprint are central to this work.

The work is shown on two monitors contained within the outline of the kitchen space. This outline extends from the floor to the wall and ceiling of the gallery space and is complemented by a one to one scaled rubbing of the kitchen floor placed under the monitors. The first video shows my hand tracing and touching every inch of the kitchen space, the walls, cabinets and ceiling. The camera frames my hand only, as it attempts to memorize the kitchen space by touch. There is no audio component for this video. The second video is a mime lesson on how to mime the kitchen at 2731 Francis Ave. The instructor on the video (an actual mime apprentice and a resident of 2731 Francis) shows us how to mime the architectural features of the kitchen space.