York Chang, January 25

ALL DOGMA HAS ITS DAY

Ideology represents the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence
-Althusser

This work is heavily influenced by my recent exhaustive investigation into visceral realism, a short-lived Latin American conceptual art movement active in Argentina during the economic crisis in the 1990's. The visceral realists were engaged in creating new forms of institutional critique, and organized their own radical version of "happenings" that took the form of small riots in commercial galleries, museum takeovers, and abductions of curators. I continue to be drawn to their body of work for the manner in which it exemplifies the intersection between crisis, catastrophe, and creativity. The work in this show, which I consider to be a single installation, investigates the visual politics of violent spectacle and protest, and the close relationship between political extremism and the concept of a "suspension of disbelief" in literary theory.