Remi Arora: Night Shift
May 14 to June 22, 2008
At the centre of Remi Arora’s video practice is the study of artificial light and how it is translated through the prosthetic eye of the camera. His ongoing research stemmed from an initial interest in rendering portraits of places in video format. Arora sees the camera as an interlocutor between what is actually occurring and what can be perceived with the naked eye. For the Art Centre’s exhibition, Arora makes the invisible visible through video projection and large format glossy photographs.
Arora’s video works are the result of a series of nocturnal stakeouts conducted in front of empty parking lots, abandoned gas stations, strip malls, and motels: transforming the mundane into the magical. By manipulating the mechanics of the camera, Arora exposes an infinite spectrum of gaseous colors in the white fluorescent tubes common in public signage, particularly in urban spaces. While Arora’s videos could almost be read as technical exercises in photography, they in fact engage the viewer in a painterly discourse. As formal explorations of color, movement and composition, Arora’s videos are anchored within a painting tradition.
The exhibition also included large format digital photographs. Arora literally freezes what he refers to as “the latent image” and isolates what would normally be invisible to the naked eye. The glossy prints depict the same scene at various stages in the neon’s color cycles.
— The above text is paraphased from Haig Aivazian.
Remi Arora engaged interdisciplinary studies and fine arts at John Abbott College (Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue, Québec), the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux Arts (Paris, France), Concordia University in Montreal, Québec (BFA 2004), and the University of Guelph (MFA 2008). Selected international exhibitions include Long Distance: Between Location and Emotion at The Third Line Gallery (Dubai, United Arab Emirates), Video Salon 2 at the Centre Culturel André Malraux (Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina), and Moving Windows at the Museum of Modern Art (Busan, Korea). He has been a visiting artist at the Elora Centre for the Arts where he co-directed The Lightbulb Factory Arts Camp (2004–2005).
Images:
Top: Untitled (Marquee), 2008 (video still, diptych)
Centre: Untitled (PkGar), 2008 (still, single channel video, 3.44 mins., colour)