Parallel Storms: Works by Janie Geiser at Track 16 Gallery

Parallel Storms | Image by Janie Geiser

On Saturday, April 21, a reception will be held at Track 16 Gallery in Los Angeles for Parallel Storms: Works by Janie Geiser, a new exhibition of work by the multidisciplinary artist and CalArts faculty member.

The exhibition features a mix of video projections, photography, and animatronics. The centerpiece, a three-channel video installation—Look and Learn Parts 2, 4, and 5—is an attempt to unearth “possible and impossible images” from found photographs.

To create the video, Geiser rephotographed found images—primarily 1950’s-era school class photos—and juxtaposed them with a wide range of visual instructions, including how-to manuals and diagrams. This approach is meant to create dialogues and associations between the “adult-created structures that frame childhood and the practices of institutional learning.”

Also on view will be Photographs: Double Image and Falling Figure, a series of three motorized puppets.

Gesirer’s practice includes performance, film, and installation, and is noted for its recontextualization of abandoned images and objects, its embrace of artifice, and its investigation of memory, power, and loss. Gesier is also one of the pioneers of the renaissance of American avant-garde puppet theater. Her work has been recognized with a Doris Duke Artist Award, Guggenheim Fellowship, an Obie Award, and funding from Creative Capital, the Rockefeller Foundation, NEA, Center for Cultural Innovation, among other foundations.

Parallel Storms is being shown in conjunction with Too Many Ways, an exhibition of work by Laura Heit, former co-chair of the Experimental Animation Program at CalArts. A reception for Heit’s exhibition of work will be held concurrently with Geiser’s, on April 21.

—by Vanessa Roveto