Haswellediger
The Beat

This summer, New York gallery, Haswellediger presented a selection of five videos, curated by Bozidar Brazda that use beat as its own proto-language. Una Szeemann’s Thrill Me (2004) compresses Michael Jackson’s video anthology into a nine minute edit that pits musical and chronological time against one another in a contemporary twist on Dorian Gray. Ruilova’s stripped down Beat & Perv (1999) utilizes editing in a way that is more suggestive of rhythm than chronology. The videos of Vlatka Horvat, Lucile Desamory and Terence Koh/Banks Violette also emphasize rhythm, the body, percussive editing and the biology of time. Horvat’s Left to Right and Back (2003) takes shape as an infinite loop that has the artist banging across a room while hidden in a large rolling container — a literal human beat box. Finally the collaborative video by Koh/Violette Untitled (enter fear light / I may not climb the social ladder but I can jump the schoolyard fence) (2006) condenses the language of body, beat, and passing time, to its most basic form. The sound of one hand clapping. Or a slap in the face.