If I have come “outside myself,” then I am no longer localized, and this tells me something new about who I am, my relation to space in particular. I am not a fully or exclusively bounded sort of being, since whatever I am, I have the capacity to appear elsewhere. I am a kind of being who is here and there, apparently at once. I can, as it were, face myself, and this involves a certain measure of self-loss (“I have become other to myself”); it also entails a surprising recurrence of myself at a spatial distance from where I thought I was. —Judith Butler
Through her work, Mika Tajima makes us aware of the invisible structures of communal existence through our ever-evolving relationship with technology and the built environment. The title of this exhibition, Super Natural, draws on the notion of an order of existence that exceeds the laws of nature and stretches beyond the observable universe. Inside the cultural economies of heightened technological efficiency and optimization, the boundaries between our authentic and digital identities have become blurred to the point of unrecognizability. In the artist’s words, “Under the regime of techno-capitalism, we are the subject of contactless forces from within and beyond. In my practice, I’m transmediating between the invisible and the material to represent and understand the agency of being uncontainable, unreachable, and not yet knowable.” That is, our individual and communal agencies, which so often are vulnerable and contingent, are subjects of deep inquiry as transitory agents at the threshold between familiarity and otherness.
Super Natural presents a selection of Tajima’s latest bodies of work, from her Negative Entropy monumental textile wall pieces to her Pranayama milled walnut and rose quartz monoliths, Anima and Mirror blown glass sculptures, Ulterior trompe l’oeil gold-foil air-jet wallpaper, and Art d’Ameublement thermoformed paintings. The show takes visitors through a journey of somatic energy that is in continuous transmigration, dispersing and coming together through the space of the Hill Art Foundation.
At the center of the exhibition is Negative Entropy, a monumental woven textile representing a spectrogram, or a visualization of sound frequencies, derived from a communal sound bath. Its mural-size scale, vibrant texture, and striking colors—violet sound waves punctured by vertical fluorescent lime and horizontal yellow bands—offers a dynamic visualization that the viewer experiences first from afar, then intimately by walking the massive width of the piece. Similar to the release of energy through pressure points in acupuncture, sound baths clear discordant energy fields through principles of quantum physics and sacred geometry, leading to inner visionary experiences. In past iterations, these textile acoustic portraits have referenced the Jacquard loom (recording as they do the postindustrial conditions of its own obsolescence), meditations in temples, and fusion explosion tests of a compact reactor developed to produce clean power. The three Negative Entropy works on view, while formally a nod to the modernist sublime, also reference energy generated directly from sound-wave brain stimulations, breathing exercises, and sound baths—all invisible energy fields that, when released, induce well-being and a state of harmony. Tajima states, “I try to heighten the awareness of this immaterial economy and its production in my work through the images, material, and spatialities it conjures.”
Perceived energy fields flow through the gallery spaces from the Ulterior trompe l’oeil gold air jets, which are positioned on the walls based on pressure points of an acupuncture diagram. These energy flows also reference the Ayurvedic practice of controlling breath, and thus life force. The Pranayama sculptures are perforated with bronze jet nozzles and made out of milled walnut, carved like ancient monoliths to conform to the shape of a body that inhales and exhales flows of air and spiritual life. The monoliths convey a controlled form of relaxation through their ergonomic design and aim toward productivity. The rose quartz Pranayama (Monolith, Rose Quartz) stones reflect pressure points from the head, which is often mapped as a microcosm of the body. Rose quartz is significant for its natural capacities to generate electricity and regulate timekeeping. These works integrate the ancient practice of acupuncture with the technology of electromagnetic energy to penetrate the psyche and augment one’s mental state through the body.
The Anima blown-glass sculptures give shape to the flows of air and energy implied in the Pranayama sculptures. These transparent forms are amalgams of prosthetics, internal organs, robotics, and body braces, but they also conjure something alien. Counteracting the fragility and ephemeral flow of air, Tajima’s dark Mirror series conjures control, regulation, and power through the black, curved exteriors that conceal the air nozzles. The very notion of breath—vital to many species’ existence since time immemorial—took on a renewed significance with the global COVID-19 pandemic, anti-Asian hate crimes, and George Floyd’s murder and the momentum of Black Lives Matter movement. Anima and Mirror remind us that under circumstances of physical and psychological lockdown, survival against racial injustice exacerbated by a global health crisis has become ever more urgent.
If I have come “outside myself,” then I am no longer localized, and this tells me something new about who I am, my relation to space in particular. I am not a fully or exclusively bounded sort of being, since whatever I am, I have the capacity to appear elsewhere. I am a kind of being who is here and there, apparently at once. I can, as it were, face myself, and this involves a certain measure of self-loss (“I have become other to myself”); it also entails a surprising recurrence of myself at a spatial distance from where I thought I was. —Judith Butler
Through her work, Mika Tajima makes us aware of the invisible structures of communal existence through our ever-evolving relationship with technology and the built environment. The title of this exhibition, Super Natural, draws on the notion of an order of existence that exceeds the laws of nature and stretches beyond the observable universe. Inside the cultural economies of heightened technological efficiency and optimization, the boundaries between our authentic and digital identities have become blurred to the point of unrecognizability. In the artist’s words, “Under the regime of techno-capitalism, we are the subject of contactless forces from within and beyond. In my practice, I’m transmediating between the invisible and the material to represent and understand the agency of being uncontainable, unreachable, and not yet knowable.” That is, our individual and communal agencies, which so often are vulnerable and contingent, are subjects of deep inquiry as transitory agents at the threshold between familiarity and otherness.
Super Natural presents a selection of Tajima’s latest bodies of work, from her Negative Entropy monumental textile wall pieces to her Pranayama milled walnut and rose quartz monoliths, Anima and Mirror blown glass sculptures, Ulterior trompe l’oeil gold-foil air-jet wallpaper, and Art d’Ameublement thermoformed paintings. The show takes visitors through a journey of somatic energy that is in continuous transmigration, dispersing and coming together through the space of the Hill Art Foundation.
At the center of the exhibition is Negative Entropy, a monumental woven textile representing a spectrogram, or a visualization of sound frequencies, derived from a communal sound bath. Its mural-size scale, vibrant texture, and striking colors—violet sound waves punctured by vertical fluorescent lime and horizontal yellow bands—offers a dynamic visualization that the viewer experiences first from afar, then intimately by walking the massive width of the piece. Similar to the release of energy through pressure points in acupuncture, sound baths clear discordant energy fields through principles of quantum physics and sacred geometry, leading to inner visionary experiences. In past iterations, these textile acoustic portraits have referenced the Jacquard loom (recording as they do the postindustrial conditions of its own obsolescence), meditations in temples, and fusion explosion tests of a compact reactor developed to produce clean power. The three Negative Entropy works on view, while formally a nod to the modernist sublime, also reference energy generated directly from sound-wave brain stimulations, breathing exercises, and sound baths—all invisible energy fields that, when released, induce well-being and a state of harmony. Tajima states, “I try to heighten the awareness of this immaterial economy and its production in my work through the images, material, and spatialities it conjures.”
Perceived energy fields flow through the gallery spaces from the Ulterior trompe l’oeil gold air jets, which are positioned on the walls based on pressure points of an acupuncture diagram. These energy flows also reference the Ayurvedic practice of controlling breath, and thus life force. The Pranayama sculptures are perforated with bronze jet nozzles and made out of milled walnut, carved like ancient monoliths to conform to the shape of a body that inhales and exhales flows of air and spiritual life. The monoliths convey a controlled form of relaxation through their ergonomic design and aim toward productivity. The rose quartz Pranayama (Monolith, Rose Quartz) stones reflect pressure points from the head, which is often mapped as a microcosm of the body. Rose quartz is significant for its natural capacities to generate electricity and regulate timekeeping. These works integrate the ancient practice of acupuncture with the technology of electromagnetic energy to penetrate the psyche and augment one’s mental state through the body.
The Anima blown-glass sculptures give shape to the flows of air and energy implied in the Pranayama sculptures. These transparent forms are amalgams of prosthetics, internal organs, robotics, and body braces, but they also conjure something alien. Counteracting the fragility and ephemeral flow of air, Tajima’s dark Mirror series conjures control, regulation, and power through the black, curved exteriors that conceal the air nozzles. The very notion of breath—vital to many species’ existence since time immemorial—took on a renewed significance with the global COVID-19 pandemic, anti-Asian hate crimes, and George Floyd’s murder and the momentum of Black Lives Matter movement. Anima and Mirror remind us that under circumstances of physical and psychological lockdown, survival against racial injustice exacerbated by a global health crisis has become ever more urgent.
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