Griga's work stimulated me as a cultural expression of the logic that people use to explain their conception of cognition, and the respondent pseudo-spiritual practices that arise unconsciously from it. For his conception of memory is arid and mechanical (he admits this). Many artists produce sentimental works about memory and loss (like Proust); here, it is reduced to a purely physical process. Griga is doing nothing more than submitting to the mythical-scientific conception of what memory is popularly claimed to be: instead of an intimate activity of the human spirit which is accompanied by processes in the brain, memory is nothing more than brain processes.
It is the old paradigm of the human as machine, the principles of the external world of perception projected onto the realm of the soul (the principal of causality and separateness, I see as present in Griga's solipsistic photos purportedly representing memory images: grainy portraits of people alone), a conception in truth outdated since quantum mechanics yet nevertheless persistent in culture. However, the human spirit longs for something more than an existence without spiritual content, so then—and this is key—it takes refuge in flights of spiritism: in the case of this exhibition, it is a haunting pseudo-ritual recorded on video, or striving to personalize the VHS castings with blood, and more. The two go hand-in-hand: a deadened view of the world, the compensatory bizarre spiritism of old religious fanaticism, shamanism, and New Age chakra mysticism. Both are violent conceptions/activities (or passivities) to the human spirit. It is profoundly disturbing to see it brought out so honestly in an exhibition/performance.
-A.C. Frabetti
I CANNOT REMEMBER ALL THAT I HAVE FORGOTTEN, New Work by Peiter Griga, Opening January 22, 6pm, Continuing through March 6, 2010 at Prairie, 4035 Hamilton Avenue in Northside. 557-3819. Gallery hours are Tuesday-Friday 10-6 and Saturday 10-4.
Photo: exhibition view, courtesy of Prairie.
