White Flag Projects is preparing for the launch of a new exhibition, Tommy Hartung & Uri Aran. Both artists are well known in the New York art scene and have had their work included in both solo and group exhibitions. Although the two have collaborated for years, this will be their first exhibition together. Hartung and Aran come from unique backgrounds and influences, but their work shares a personal nature and a surreal, abstract quality.

Hartung currently lives and works in Queens, where he creates his pieces in his basement studio. He builds his sets in his living space, from household objects, mundane materials, and any other “rejectamenta” he is drawn to. Hartung’s chosen media are stop-motion animation and sculpture. In contrast to the current trend of smooth, computer-generated animation, Hartung utilizes his handcrafted props and their intentionally un-lifelike movements. Correspondingly, he makes use of traditional filming techniques from the pre-CGI era. He is drawn to what he calls “dead cinema” – most of the moving objects in his film are not alive. He is not interested in describing a real or lifelike situation, but in creating unbelievable characters and discovering what meaning can be created through them. His works draw on other media, taking a story or theme and filtering it through the lens of the artist’s reactions and ideas about an object or setting. The films are personal, marked indelibly by Hartung’s persona and environment, but address universal, vaguely political topics like imperialism, cultural equity, and conquest.

Hartung’s 2009 film Ascent of Man was inspired by a 1973 BBC documentary about human development, written and narrated by Jacob Bronowski. Hartung combined footage from the original with his own stop-motion animation. The original documentary is linear and didactic, but Hartung’s film removes any markers of temporal specificity and emphasizes the “dramaturgical, visual and aural cues” Bronowski used to create his narrative of the ascendant arc of human evolution. The resulting film is a poetic and mysterious interpretation of humanity that was exhibited by White Flag Projects in 2011 and recently purchased by MoMA.

Aran is an Israeli-born artist currently living and working in New York. He works in video, drawing, painting, monotype, and sculpture. Like Hartung, Aran utilizes familiar objects in his work in a manner that resists easy interpretation. Where Hartung’s work takes its initial cue from other pieces of literature and film, Aran’s work seems to take its cue from an unknown system of meaning. Both artists are interested in exploring meaning and how it is created, and Aran does so through arbitrariness and investigating how arbitrarily chosen objects can gain or suggest meaning. In contrast to Hartung’s preference for stop-motion, Aran utilizes live action and directs his human actors. If Hartung draws his techniques from classic cinema, Aran draws his from Dada and Surrealism, such as repetition, non sequitur, and visual incongruity. His films often feature his actors repeating sentiments or clichés in exhausting permutations that seem to hint at a new meaning that transcends literal context. Aran also uses repeated shapes and things (circles, spheres, cookies, flames, coconuts) in his work. The repetition of these absurd elements implies a set of rules or reasons that the viewer does not have access to. Aran’s work is currently on view at Gavin Brown’s enterprise where his solo show will open January 14.

Aran’s 2008 piece Untitled(Bus) features cue balls stuck with glaze to a tabletop and labeled “BUS” with short strips of embossing tape. The deceptively simple arrangement seems haphazard yet deliberate, answering to some unknown logic that feels just out of reach to the viewer. The balls and the spilled liquid almost but not quite connect to create a narrative. The use of contrasting materials and forms is characteristic of Aran’s work, as is the careful composition. His piece “Dogs and Cats” utilizes coconuts and a cup and saucer; the roughness of the coconut contrasts sharply with the smoothness of the dishes. Aran’s use of domestic objects and familiar words serves as an investigation into how and why these familiar objects and words suggest meaning to and strike a chord with the viewer.

Tommy Hartung & Uri Aran will open with a reception from 6-8 PM on Thursday, January 19 and will remain on view until February 18, 2012. For more information on this exhibit and other upcoming events at White Flag, please visit www.whiteflagprojects.org.

(1/12/12 by Stephanie Trimboli, Intern)