Marco Brambilla: Creation (Megaplex) 02. May 2014 - 31. May 2014

The first solo exhibition of Marco Brambilla in Germany features a large-scale 3D video installation from the Megaplex-series and a new body of works.

Drawing from an array of pop culture sources in order to re-contextualize century old histories, Brambilla's Megaplex series of works continue to investigate our relationship to the concept of spectacle as presented in contemporary film. Creation (Megaplex) is the third chapter of a trilogy of 3D video collages which began with Civilization (Megaplex) in 2008 and Evolution (Megaplex) in 2010.

Creation (Megaplex) presents a spectacular cinematic composition that culls from a vast archive of iconic Hollywood films. Set within the form of a giant DNA helix, Brambilla takes the viewer on a spiralling trajectory that begins with a big bang and continues through embryonic inception, idyllic, Eden-like bliss and decadence. The elaborate succession finally culminates in a state of super-saturation, where structure implodes and interminably re-invents itself to begin again as an erupting point in space. The digitally assembled images generate a hyper-realistic landscape of clouds, meadows and burning cityscapes, against which humanity oscillates between a frenzied production and consumption of its own creation. With each cycle of the work, Brambilla’s video engulfs the viewer in an overload of imagery almost impossible to sustain, while offering the viewer a specific perception of Hollywood - which it both celebrates and satirizes.

Also presented is a new body of work also dealing in appropriation of film, but in contrast to the super-saturated digital collages of the Megaplex Trilogy; these works focus on a single image and transform its original presentation and context. The four pieces on view; "Celluloid (The Seachers 1956)", "Celluloid (2001: A Space Odyssey 1968)", "Celluloid (An American in Paris 1951)" and "Celluloid (The Wizard of OZ 1939)", each present an iconic film scene played out in full, but only after being returned to its physical analogue source as celluloid. The film image as emulsion is then distressed through a photochemical process to the point of near-abstraction and re-presented as a modulated slow-motion loop. The abstracted but nevertheless familiar moment taps into our collective consciousness; observing a medium on the verge of extinction, and drawing a parallel between the ephemeral quality of celluloid and imagery associated with the “golden age” of cinema.