Erik Smith "The Ghost of James Lee Byars Calling"

The Shadow Cabinet - part I:


Curator Laura Schleussner (DE) presents a project by the German-American artist Erik Smith (Boston, 1967) who lives in Berlin.

In this installation, the work of the internationally renowned performance and conceptual artist, James Lee Byars (1932-1997) is fused with the underground realm of Black Metal music. Byars' dramatic flair and unconditional pursuit of 'the essential' in form and concept parallel the dark theatricality of Black Metal and its characteristic idolisation of pagan myths, Satanism, violence and destruction. The project coincides with a recent discovery in the archives of de Appel: a large number of 'official' letters and personal notes sent by James Lee Byars to Wies Smals, founder of de Appel, during the 1970's.
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The title The Ghost of James Lee Byars Calling is taken from the title of an exhibition presented by Byars in Los Angeles in 1969. Byars's recurring obsession with his own death (including an exhibition in Brussels in 1994 The Death of James Lee Byars) can be seen in the context of the reduced, ephemeral quality of his performances and installations. Although Smith's work might initially appear to be an homage to Byars, it is more an invocation of cultural obsessions with blackness and the staging of death. Paralleling Byars' dramatic flair and his uncompromising pursuit of the essential in form and concept are Black Metal's dark theatrics and preoccupations with pagan mythos, satanism, violence and destruction.

For Byars, who often dressed in black, the absence and transcendence communicated in his work were devoid of any notion of spiritual redemption. As a reductive concept, death was a philosophical pursuit. Preaching negation, Black Metal proclaims an outright rejection of Christian salvation with its celebrations of the demonic. While enveloping the viewer in the utterly black atmosphere of nothingness, Smith's installation oscillates between Byars lyrical minimalism and the exaggerated gestures of Metal. The pairing does suggest a certain tongue-in-cheek stance towards the artist as shaman. Smith's work, however, is able to maintain this irony without discrediting the validity of a cultural drive towards death, although pop does seem to prevail. Byars talks of the perfect death, while the Black Metal icons Darkthrone scream: Total Death. Byars' ghost may be calling, but Metal lives...

Opening Friday February 16th, 6pm
With a performance by Sammath (www.sammath.nl) 'Furious Black Metal'


The Shadow Cabinet - part II:

'Route A1'

Curator Petra Heck (1975, NL) presents a poster project that playfully explores the polarity between uniqueness and reproduction. Ten artists were asked to design an A1 format poster. The reproductions are on show in de Appel and lie piled up on the floor as free give-aways. In addition, each poster design is on display for a week in and around SKOR's location, de Inkijk. The framed posters will also be on view for four weeks throughout the city.

Route A1 is a guerrilla action that utilizes the poster as mass media exponent to lay claim to the city as an alternative art space. The message of the Route A1 posters differs from that of commercial statements: the art posters promote nothing and have no announcement to make. Everyone is used to non-stop advertising, screaming texts and overloaded images, that's why Willem Oorebeek's triple printed Elle covers, Pae White's extreme aestheticism or Kai Bernau's text orientated works grab your attention.

Route A1 is not a thematic exhibition. It is an idea leading to a form and the consequential presentation thereof. Not a unique artwork of which only a single copy or a limited edition exists, but an endlessly reproducible poster. The selected artists all have a specific reason for working with posters. From different disciplines, based on various content and formal principles, they have designed an autonomous poster for Route A1.

With artists: Kai Bernau (NL), Olivier Foulon (BE), Kristof van Gestel (BE), Jakob Kolding (DK), Ken Lum (CAN), Olaf Nicolai (DE), Willem Oorebeek (BE), Lidwien van de Ven (NL) and Pae White (USA).