ART CITIES:N.York-Louise Bourgeois
The ‘60s ushered in new technologies and new frontiers for image production. The development of laser technology in 1962 enabled the creation of holograms that displayed 3-dimensional images on a 2-dimensional surface. Artists were drawn to holography, hailed as a medium of the future that turned space inside out, for its spatial, volumetric, and sequential qualities, and to the creative possibilities it offered in contrast to photography, film, and early video.
By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Cheim & Read Gallery Archive
Louise Bourgeois: Holograms” at Cheim & Read Gallery in New York is the first exhibition devoted exclusively to this little-known aspect of the artist’s long, groundbreaking career. In 1998 the artist was approached by C-Project, a New York-based fine arts holographic studio dedicated to exploring the creative potential of 3-dimensional photographs through the talents of top-flight painters and sculptors. The plates from Bourgeois’ resulting suite of eight holograms are on display. The haunting, domestic objects and sinister interiors that define Bourgeois’s work appear wholly present in her untitled holograms from 1998, the untitled deep red holograms from depict empty chairs suggestive of dollhouse furniture, one on a pedestal under glass, that fit with her lifelong project of undomesticating the accouterments of domestic life. While it fits the content perfectly, Bourgeois’ use of this shade of red is actually the result of a materials-based decision. Holograms are glass plates that appear black until they come to life when struck by light at a particular angle. Depending on the way the glass plate is originally encoded, the hologram will have a base color of red or blue. The master plates for Bourgeois’ editions are red, and it was her intention not to tamper with the purity of the diffracted light carrying the image to the viewer’s eye.
Info: Cheim & Read, 547 West 25th Street, New York, Duration: 5/1-11/2/17, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 10:00-18:00, www.cheimread.com