Catherine Yass: Lock

In her first solo exhibition in New York, British artist Catherine Yass will present “Lock”, a new film shot at the Three Gorges Dam in China’s Yangtze River.  Projected on two facing walls on opposite sides of the gallery, the film places the viewer, physically and psychologically, at the center of an icon of China’s ambitions for industrial growth.  In addition, she will show a new series of light boxes of her distinctively surreal and evocative images, also from China.  The exhibition opens to the public on Friday, October 27, from 6 to 8 pm, and the artist will be present.

Yass first became known for her experimentations with photography, creating light boxes that explore physical and architectural space and the way in which these environments are experienced by their inhabitants.  Her signature method involves manipulating both the exposure and development of the film and layering a positive transparency on top of a negative.  The results are richly colored, ethereal abstractions that embody the dualities of reality and illusion, presence and absence.  At once the viewer is given a perspective that is both all-encompassing and nonexistent.

In 2002, Yass used the same concept with her film “Descent,” shooting while suspended from an 800-ft crane.  An 8-minute pan down the side of a tower that was projected upside down, “Descent” displayed Yass’s minimalist aesthetic and restrained use of time and movement to heighten the tension between the viewer and their  surroundings.  “Lock” expounds upon these methods as Yass documents a passage through the Three Gorges Dam.  Shot using cameras pointed both forward and backward, the film shows the journey from two viewpoints simultaneously.  The austere, immense walls and rows of mooring columns are representative of dreams of industrial power yet recall imagery of ancient temples and pyramids.  After moving through the vast and powerful water, the boat is held in a suspended present, within the gates of the lock, as it awaits the close of one end of its journey and the entrance into its next.

Yass has shown in numerous museums and galleries worldwide, including Tate Britain and Tate Modern, London; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney; and Tel Aviv Museum of Art.  She is currently featured in the Shanghai Biennale, and in 2001, she represented Britain at the 10^th Indian Triennale, where she was awarded for her portraits of Bollywood stars and Mumbai cinema houses.  She was shortlisted in 2002 for the Turner Prize, organized by Tate.  In 2003, the Brooklyn Academy of Music premiered Split Sides, a collaboration between Yass, choreographer Merce Cunningham, and musicians Radiohead and Sigur Rós.  Next spring, New York’s Jewish Museum will present work by Yass in Dateline Israel: New Photography and Video Art.