Mark Dion: Theatre of the Natural World

welcome my name is Mark Dion I'm an American artist and I work on the topic of the representation of nature a history of ideas that we form that let us think about what gets to be called the natural world I do this through looking at institutions looking at the history of ideas and realizing that science doesn't hold a monopoly on what gets to be called nature there's other people and other factors from surrealist to Hunters well I think when you enter the first gallery you're surprised that the spaces is opened up again right it's bright and airy and in the center of that is a very large aviary so you're confronted with a number of other living things things that are sharing your space and you can actually enter the space with them so you can kind of share the space [Music] there's a conceit in the library for the birds of London which is that if birds could read it would be better for them there's a lot of things that they should know I want viewers to see like how close we are to them how different we are from them in the same way that they're remarkably stunningly indifferent to the literature we've provided for them the big goal of mine for the whole project is just too slow viewers down what I want to really have them take time with individual works to experience works well to be careful viewers because I make work to reward careful viewings theater of the natural world and for the Whitechapel Gallery it brings together when I think are some of the most significant works I've made in the UK so things that would never have had the opportunity to exist side-by-side we encounter what seems to be a period piece where a period room from the 1920s the Bureau of the center of the study of surrealism and its legacy which features some of the stranger more bizarre objects from the behind the scenes of the Manchester Museum these are orphaned collections things that no longer fit the mandate in the museum but still generate exciting and strange readings readings very much reminiscent of the things that the surrealist themselves were interested in all of those are somehow embedded in this room as well as a remarkable wallpaper that one needs to decode what's important is that the viewer not get too hung up on the art part when they seeing this exhibition and I think that the art nothing I'm ashamed of the art part but that it's less important whether it's hard than whether it's interesting right and I want people to have a very interesting and interesting time here you know I want them to bring a lot more of themselves I want them to feel comfortable to push back and take time I want them to be critical I want them to look with care I want them to put energy into it and I promise as an artist to kind of mirror that back to them the more they put into it the more they'll get out of this work

Channel: Whitechapel Gallery

Views: 7,603

Rating: 4.9166665 out of 5

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Id: ae0A4cnHfb0

Length: 3min 35sec (215 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 27 2018