Narcissus Trance: Artist files

Wade Guyton

Acclaimed New York artist whose work features in the collections of the
Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art,
New York; and the Musee d'Art Moderne et Contemporain, Geneva. He has
had solo exhibitions at Galerie Gisela Capitain, Cologne, Les Biennales de
Lyon, Lyon and Portikus, Frankfurt (all 2008). Last year he collaborated with
Kelly Walker on a multi-room commission for the Italian pavilion at the Venice
Bienniale.

The International Necronautical Society

INS was launched in 1999 by the author and artist Tom McCarthy. The
society is an expansive, networked organisation that slides between the
worlds of art, fiction, philosophy and media. The INS has broadcast from
locations in Europe and America; as part of the Tate Triennial 2009 prologues
at Tate Britain, London, The Drawing Center, NYC (2007), Galleria Medium,
Bratislava (2006) and The ICA (2004).

Sayshun Jay

Artist and curator based in London. Jay makes experiments utilising a range
of design, graphic and video software to create still and moving visual
compositions under the constraints of virtual machines. Jay has previously
worked with Joe Watling on an artwork series entitled Collaborate exhibited at
Enders Gallery, London, Club Attent, Rotterdam and Anon in London’s
Whitechapel. He has presented his independent artworks in the Free Art Fair
(2008 & 09), Open Art, Orebro Konsthall, Sweden and ‘Presque Rien 2’,
Laure Genillard Gallery, London (2008).

Rose Kallal

New York City-based 16mm film and sound artist. Kallal has presented her
work at various galleries including ‘Into the Prism’ at PS1 and Gavin Brown’s
Enterprise at Passerby, NYC (2006), The Power Plant Contemporary Art
Gallery, Toronto and at NADA Miami (2008). Kallal’s performances include
multiple 16mm film loop installations with live sound. A frequent collaborator,
artist Mark Beasley has performed spoken word alongside Kallal at Lisa
Cooley Gallery, NYC, ‘Blood Transfusion for a Ghost’ at PS1 as part of the
Kenneth Anger retrospective (2009) and at ‘Barefoot in the Head:
Futurological Poetry Reading’ for Performa, NYC (2009).
Takeshi Murata

New York City-based film and video artist. His artwork uses digital software
design to construct filters through which he runs archival material. The
process can be likened to a digital acid, stripping back the surface information
and remoulding narrative structures. He has had solo exhibitions at Silver
Equinox, Ratio 3, San Francisco, CA (2006) and at Gallery.Sora, Tokyo,
Japan (2007). He has taken part in group shows and international festivals
including ‘Straylight Cavern’ at Cell Projects, London (2009), e-flux video
rental at Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon (2008), DOTMOV festival,
Tokyo (2004) and Aion Experiments at Project Arts Centre, Dublin (2010).

Karl O'Connor & Mick Harris

O'Connor & Harris both emerged from the 90's Birmingham industrial music
scene, O’Connor from the Downwards label and Harris as the former
drummer from the cult British band Napalm Death. Their sound works explore
the act of experience and perception, hijacking electronic media aesthetics
and delivering a detailed sonic palette that evokes the latent and primordial
senses. They have contributed to We Can Elude Control, a series of sound-
art performances developed in partnership with Spike Island in 2008.

Mark Titchner

London-based artist who has exhibited internationally and was nominated for
the Turner Prize 2006. His diverse work explores ideas of belief, perception
and alternative systems of psychical and social order. His recent project ‘Feel
Better Now! (Apathy and the New Sincerity)’ was presented at the
Serpentine’s Manifesto Marathon (2009) and ‘Psychosomatic Acid Test’
featured as part of GSK Contemporary at the Royal Academy of Arts (2009).
He has also produced commissions for Channel Four and contributed to the
Ukraine Pavilion at the 2007 Venice Biennale.

Sara VanDerBeek

New York City-based artist. VanDerBeek uses a sculptural process of layering

found photography to evoke wide shifts in memory and perception within the
larger ‘superimposed’ frame of the photographs she exhibits. Her solo shows
include; ‘Mirror in the Sky’ at D'Amelio Terras, NYC (2008) and ‘The Principle
of Superimposition’, The approach E2, London. She has featured in numerous
group exhibitions in America and Europe, notably ‘New Photography’ at
MoMA, NYC (2009), ‘Currents: Recent Acquisitions’ at The Hirshhorn
Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C. (2008) and ‘Past Forward’,
TheZabludowicz Collection, Project Space 176, London (2008).
Ben Washington

Washington is a London-based artist whose practice destabilises the

intersection between space as it exists, as it is imagined and as it is
experienced. Solo exhibitions and residencies include ‘The Private Citizen’
Galerie Dana Charkasi, Vienna (2010) and the Shatana Artists Workshop,
Shatana, Jordan (2008.) In 2009 Washington participated in the Havana X
Biennial in Cuba. He has also exhibited work at Volume, London (2009),
Fordham University, NYC (2008) and Indus Valley University, Karachi,
Pakistan (2008).

Joe Watling

London-based artist. Dealing with notions of structure and surface he

intervenes, negotiating parallel processes of construction and deconstruction,
both revealing and concealing the illusions of everyday physical spaces.
Watling has exhibited his work at ‘The Devil’s Necktie’ Woodmill, London
(2010), ‘CAFÉ TROJAN HORSE’ The Gallery, Goldsmiths (2009), ‘Long Story
Short Notice’ With Patrick Coyle, STORE Gallery, London (2009) ‘Gag-a-Gag’
Enders Gallery, London & Attent Club, Rotterdam (2008) and SHIFT Project,
London (ongoing).

Curators:

Shama Khanna

Independent curator and writer based in London. From 2006 she was
Assistant Curator at Showroom, London, before traveling to New York to
participate in the Writers’ Hub at PERFORMA07. In 2008 she returned to New
York to work at P.S. 1 and e-flux project space with whom she continues to
collaborate. In 2009 she co-founded ‘Geopolyphonies’, a self-organised group
platform for theory and practice-based research in local contexts which was
launched in Oslo, Norway earlier this year. She has had writing commissions
published by Axis, Leeds, Volume and Byam Shaw, London. For the last
academic year Khanna has been Curator at Large at The Gallery at
Goldsmiths and from October 2010 will be resident curator at E:vent Gallery in
east London.

Paul Purgas

London based curator and sound artist. Purgas trained as an architect before
graduating from the Royal College of Art in 2004. He has since completed
curatorial projects with Arnolfini, Spike Island, the Crafts Council, and co-
curated the off-site projects for the 2009 Tate Triennial. He is currently based
at the Tricycle in Kilburn.
Image references

Rose Kallal Fill This Room With Sound (2010)

Courtesy of the artist

Ben Washington Konig der Strasse (2010)

Courtesy of the artist

Sayshun Jay Rorschach – Thought Disorder – Alcohol – Tolerance (2010)

Courtesy of the artist

Sara VanDerBeek The Principle of Superimposition 2 (2008)

Courtesy of The approach, London

Takeshi Murata Untitled Pink Dot (2007)

Courtesy of the artist

Contact

For further information please contact Shama Khanna by email:

shama.khanna@gmail.com

or by telephone +44 (0) 7909922110.

Project supported by Arts Council England and Henry Moore Foundation. In

association with the Tricycle.