“Cheerful and serious works of the imagination unfold to disassemble and reassemble time and space in a huge cinema.”
“A fantastic moment of immersion in which the black box of a cinema turns into the white cube of an art gallery.”
“The very point where the cinematographic illusion encounters a desire for pure art.”
The Cinematic Montage
Today we live in a so called ‘era of composite images.” Cartoons, movies and TV dramas show a world that has been dismantled and then reassembled, representing it via the images composed by the superimposition or juxtaposition of disassembled pieces. This exhibition focuses on the development of the montage as part of the contemporary cultural background, and introduces a collection of montages made in various forms of modern art from socio-political criticism to surrealistic fantasy, monologue narration to visual rhythm.
Since the 20th century, modern art has developed a variety of forms and meanings in combination with the characteristic features of cinema. The term “cinematic” has formed an important discourse on contemporary art and is profusely used in various art genres, including painting, photography, installation and video. The technique of composing a work by mixing various elements of performance, sculpture, cinema and still pictures is now widely regarded as one of the most experimental and spectacular forms seen in the work of many contemporary artists. These works provide viewers with an environment in which they can immerse themselves in the exhibition, guiding them into a realm of imagination through a transcendence of time and space. This is the moment in which the mental activities taking place within the black box of a cinema become more active in the white cube of an art gallery.
What is the “montage technique”? – Aestheticism of fragments
The “montage technique,” which played a crucial role in the development of cinema in the 19th century, has now become a very important factor for building composite images of time and space. In this age of composition, the meaning and scope of montage has continued to expand to the extent that some conclude that “all viewpoints of the world form a single montage” and thus the montage is now treated as being more important than ever before. What is, then, the original meaning of the montage, how has it developed, and what are its characteristics? Montage is a French word meaning “putting together” and refers to a method of film editing that combines fragmentary film shots selected from separate films to create visual rhythms and psychological sensations by building a new reality in cinematic time and space. It may be compared with the technique of facial composite imaging in that separate memories are put together to “create” a single object. It involves not only technical but also mental and psychological fabrication, and the montage is completed in the eye of each viewer. The fabrication takes place through various methods of arranging fragments, such as juxtaposition, segmentation and combination, and generates meaning on a new level via the conflict of two opposing pieces.
This exhibition shows the point at which cinematic fantasy intersects with the desire for pure art on the basis of such montage techniques. In film, the techniques influenced each other in the 20th century through the collage works of Braque and Picasso, Mallarme’s poetry and Rodin’s sculpture, while in photography they established an independent genre. The flood of digital images has recently led to net-based montages made via the combination of various sources collected from the web, helping further expand the scope of montages. Ultimately, this event aims at a critical understanding of today’s social, political and cultural discourses raised by the amalgamation of fragments, such as painting, sculpture, installation, sound, video and computer games, that reflect the changed environment of art due to digitalization. Indeed, today’s montages go beyond a simple combination of individual cuts as shown by the existing films and photography. In addition, the exhibition is expected to provoke a cheerful but serious stirring of the imagination by dismantling the world in which we live and then assembling the fragments within the time and space encapsulated in a cinema.
Objectives of the Exhibition
▶ The exhibition offers viewers the opportunity to become completely immersed in the artists’ cheerful but serious imaginations that disassemble and reassemble the world in cinematic time and space within the white cube of an art gallery via the montage techniques of segmentation, juxtaposition, assemblage and combination.
▶ The exhibition helps viewers experience a new cinematic form of modern art generated by amalgamating various elements of performance, sculpture, theater, film and still pictures that result in some of the most experimental and spectacular expressions of contemporary artists.
▶ The exhibition shows a special selection of montage films and guides viewers to the point where cinematic fantasy intersects with the desire for pure art via the montage techniques.
