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Eddie Clemens’s choice of title for this exhibition, a phrase taken from the science-fiction movie Terminator II (1991), reveals his interest in how physical surroundings affect human behavior. The paranoiac confusion of reality and fiction, a pervasive storyline in that film, is also an ongoing theme in his sculpture. In his recent work these concerns rest alongside his long-held interest in the vagaries of consumerism. Now focusing on the entertainment industry, his art draws attention to the ways in which architectural structures, consumption and commodified forms of entertainment conspire to hold us emotionally captive.
Clemens’s sculpture combines pristine, off-the-shelf supplies, sourced from hardware stores, with newly manufactured objects in order to satirize the slick commodity appeal of consumer products. Finding specialist engineers and manufacturers and enlisting their cooperation is an important part of his art practice. Miniature fans hidden inside his works coupled with electronic circuitry that program LED sequences and modulating lights, transform mundane objects into animated, whimsical sculptures. Reminiscent of the methods used in films and theme parks, this technical wizardry points to the increasing use of special effects, the popularity of alternate web-based realities and the audience’s insatiable desire for escapism.
Clemens’s interest in American culture goes beyond science-fiction movies. Through his use of neon bulbs and manufactured steel cubes, his sculpture lightheartedly references the sculpture of 1960s minimalists Dan Flavin and Donald Judd, whose works model the utopian values on which modernism was founded. His sculpture provides an amusing, ironic and occasionally damning commentary on contemporary New Zealand life. The works in this exhibition, produced during his tenure as 2009 Frances Hodgkins Fellow at the University of Otago, expose disturbing social realities including a youth culture driven by binge drinking. |
