Friday July 22, 7:30pm
Jacob Ciocci
“Inside the Box: People Don’t Actually Like Creativity aka F.E.A.R.=False Evidence Appearing Real aka Un-Boxing The Box from Within: Everyone Has Problems (55 likes and 43 shares) aka I’m not crazy, Society is Crazy: #hope #struggle #planetfitness #chipotle, aka This Is Dedicated To All The People Who Have Had Their Lives Wrecked by Computers, the Internet, or Social Media”
artist in person
Still from “The Urgency” (Jacob Ciocci, 2014) – Image courtesy of the artist
Microscope is extremely pleased to present a solo screening night of videos by Jacob Ciocci, including the premieres of two new short works.
The evening features a selections of single-channel pieces by Ciocci, a former member of “Paper Rad” collective and currently one half of sound/performance duo “Extreme Animals”, made over the last 11 years, many of which use the metaphor of “boxes” to describe the simultaneously imprisoning and empowering power that digital technology has on the psychological life of the American Consumer.
The centerpiece of the screening “The Urgency” (2014, 33 minutes, soundtrack by Extreme Animals) employs both found footage and video shot by the artist to take an ambivalent look at contemporary technological life and questions “the agency of the individual within a world of incomprehensible complexity and imminent doom.”
Ciocci will also premiere 2 new short video pieces: a 5-minute diaristic road trip into the mind of a lost soul, and a new Extreme Animals music video, which accompanies a new audio release on ThunderZone Entertainment entitled “This Music Does Not Apologize: 2002-2008”, and will be officially released just before the screening.
General admission $7
Students w/ valid ID $5
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Jacob Ciocci is an artist living and working in Brooklyn, NY and Oberlin, OH. In his videos, multimedia installations, websites, and performances, Ciocci investigates the cultural symbols of our time, both the popular and the obscure, the contemporary and the recently forgotten. He has performed and exhibited extensively at venues including among others the New Museum, New York, MoMA, New York, Anthology Film Archives, New York, Foxy Production, New York, Deitch Projects, New York, Cooper Cole, Toronto, CA, Tate Britain, London, UK. His work was object of a solo exhibition at Interstate Projects in September 2015. His performance group Extreme Animals and his former collective Paper Rad have received critical acclaim.
Program:
“How to Escape From The Stress Boxes”
single-channel video, color, sound, 2005, 3 minutes 54 seconds
“Don’t Worry, Be Happy, Stressful Mix”
single-channel video, color, sound, 2006, 3 minutes
“The Urgency”
single-channel video, color, soundtrack by Extreme Animals, 2014, 33 minutes
“FREEDOM ISN’T FREE/I’M NOT CRAZY, IN AN INSTITUTION, SOCIETY IS CRAZY, IN AN INSTITUTION”
single-channel video, color, sound, 2016, 5 minutes
“God Jam” (Extreme Animals music video)
single-channel video, color, sound, 2016, 3 minutes
Still from “How to Escape From The Stress Boxes” (Jacob Ciocci, 2005) – Image courtesy of the artist
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Microscope Gallery Events Series 2016 is sponsored, in part, by the Greater New York Arts Development Fund of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, administered by Brooklyn Arts Council (BAC).
With the underwriting support of the Robert D. Bielecki Foundation.
