A Hyperallergic review of Steve McQueen’s show at the Art Institute of Chicago, including an interesting meditation on the use and installation of video art in museums:
At the Art Institute of Chicago’s Steve McQueen exhibition, I saw something unusual: museum-goers spending time — minutes of it! — watching moving images. In an otherwise bustling museum, the visitors in these rooms were silent and enthralled.
McQueen and the Art Institute collaborated to make the exhibition an experience, not just a series of screens…
Visiting the McQueen exhibition cemented a conviction that has been growing in me: if you are not going to properly install film and video, it’s better to do without it…
Were McQueen’s works installed on 17” Radioshack monitors with headphones dangling next to them, I doubt any visitor would watch them for more than a few seconds, let alone try to unravel their ambiguities.
Give us some credit: Americans are sophisticated in nothing if not the moving image.
SmARTy ART Chick 