Collective Gallery
Press Release
Torsten Lauschmann
Patchwork Cinema
Exhibition, 5 June – 18 July 2010, Collective Gallery, Edinburgh.
Collective is delighted to present a solo exhibition and project by Torsten Lauschmann. Lauschmann’s expansive work incorporates drawing, installation, video, sculpture, performance, events and software creation. A previous work took the form of a worldwide, hoax project ‘World Jump Day’ ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Jump_Day). His work questions the preconceived, pushes the possible and investigates hidden aspects of media.
“Lauschmann is long overdue wider recognition for a diverse range of work reprocessed for a bewildering variety of venues and audiences. He has a playful approach to the use and misuse of technologies in his practice which has been highly influential on his peers in Scotland.” Dr Neil Mulholland, Director, Centre of Visual & Cultural Studies, Edinburgh College of Art.
Collective are working with Edinburgh International Film Festival to provide Torsten with a rich resource for his practice. The new work deconstructs the experience of time and cinema through the projected image - he will use one of the earliest forms of a camera obscura, the now obsolete slide projection and digital video projections.
In Collective’s Gallery II, ‘Patchwork Cinema’ is an alternative cinema experience with an assemblage of found film footage sourced by the artist and including early cinema and animation, edited to fit with the opening hours of the gallery, from 11am-5pm. The collaged film footage is echoed in the installation with a patchwork cinema environment including a custom-made curtain. Much of the footage has never been screened in the UK before.
Prior to entering ‘Patchwork Cinema’, Gallery I will function as a waiting area for visitors preceding their cinema experience. As part of the waiting space Torsten shows ‘Digital Clock (Growing Zeros)’ 2010 consisting of a looped 24-hour projection of a digital clock with the red numerals changed manually by visible hands. This less formal digital time matches 'correct time' local time. He will also be showing new video work ‘parlez-vous hollywood?’ (working title).
In Collective’s Guest Room, Lauschmann will be experimenting with pre-cinema optics, taking the form of a camera obscura.
Event, Thursday 24 June, 8 -9pm
Sideshow
Duration: 30 min
The Filmhouse, Lothian Road,
Part of Edinburgh International Film Festival
Sideshow is a one–off performance/screening event by artist Torsten Lauschmann, presented and commissioned by Collective in association with Edinburgh International Film Festival.
Through intervention and technological trickery, Sideshow questions the formalised cinema experience. In this new work Torsten Lauschmann references the customary cinema experience and highlights the pivotal point in early cinema when film presentation was not prescribed in the same way.
Sideshow, which will be presented at the Filmhouse in Cinema 1, uses a creative approach to technology and intervention, the audience are witness to a breakdown of standard cinema conventions and offered an alternative place from which to view film.
“Grinding through abstract oddities past and present. Including the ever so popular "What is it?" attraction. Sideshow turns the imitation of life into a special effect. Cinema reunited with its embarrassing family of distasteful grannies and boring cousins. Please leave your mobile switched on and do not touch or feed the animals.” Torsten Lauschmann on Sideshow
Collective initiated this new cross-art form residency for Torsten Lauschmann in collaboration with EIFF. For the duration of EIFF 2010, the artist has had access to all areas including industry screenings, film vaults and central film festival hub, offering a rich resource for his practice.
Torsten was commissioned to produce new work Sideshow specifically for the context of a cinema as well as the corresponding solo exhibition at Collective.
Edinburgh College of Art (eca) is a charity registered in Scotland, number SC009201
