Alex Morrison, Housewrecker (2002), 5-channel DVD video installation
[Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, BC, thru Feb 22, 2003]
Alex Morrison: Housewrecker
Catriona Jeffries Gallery
Vancouver BC thru Feb 22, 2003
Vancouver-based artist Alex Morrison is having his first solo exhibition at Catriona Jeffries Gallery with a new video installation entitled “Housewrecker”.The installation is in five parts. It uses three large video projections and two monitors to show the scene of a housewrecking party by a group of youths being evicted from their rented house.
The installation evolved from Morrison’s internationally regarded Homewrecker video loop that was shown at the Vancouver Art Gallery's These Days exhibition in 2001. Beyond performance art, beyond videography and more than photo-conceptualism, Housewrecker sets up the outgoing tenants for a display of aggression mixed with self-consciousness. The footage reveals the house room by room and floor by floor as skateboards, ironically, are used as tools of destruction.
In creating this installation, Morrison draws upon his own past works: Every House I've Ever Lived In (Drawn from Memory), Found Minimalism, and All the Old Spots. Concurrent to the video installation is a new body of photo works featuring actors and a skateboarding set from a film shot in Vancouver. Following this exhibit, the work will travel to the Frankfurt Kunstverein and to the Art Gallery of Ontario. Find more images and information about the show at www.catrionajeffries.com
