SCATTER + TERATOLOGY + SCATOLOGY =


SCAT-TERA/TOLOGY


Think of scat-tera/tology less as another boring descriptor of artistic practice but, instead, more as a mischievous incantation or a wicked spell of necromancy that both summons and ushers the cultural walking dead into the sterile confines of the 'white cube', infecting the sacred solemnity of an art gallery with the bombastic presence of low brow and lo-fi pop. Yet scat-tera/tology's inglorious paean to the ungainly nature of b-grade melodramas, retro movie posters, DIY horror, late-night adverts , illogical graphics and electronic pop music is more than just simple veneration of kitschy culture. Like any good necromantic spell, scat-tera/tology exploits these fabulous products in order to channel the perverted post-humanism that lurks beneath and throbs within their cartoony signage, wherein anything 'human' is seen as just another material to be refashioned and used to achieve a particular affect. Moulded, bloated and completely overloaded by cheap artifice, this exhibition views the human form as nothing more than a vehicle for theatrical thrills and outrageous spectacle. As something fragmented, unbelievable, rough, plastic, grotesque, vulgar and/or lowly. In a word, Scat-tera/tological!

Given that the premise of A Scat-tera/tological Experience! was to outline a particular artistic methodology, all the objects and images in the exhibition were displayed in a no-thrills fashion; the guiding idea was to simply evidence work as oppose to theatrically present work. It is for this reason the show took place in a faux-domestic setting when it was exhibited at Trocadero Art Space: saturated lighting, fake pot plants, an uncomfortable couch and blank white walls. The general aim was for the space to appear blandly impersonal, like a waiting room in a dental clinic or office building.

The exhibition was roughly divided into three main sections: GRAPHICS, FILM, and MUSIC.

The central project of the GRAPHICS section was a suite of twelve prints, titled Lurid Pictures Presents . Here, the legacies and traditions of self portraiture are humorously addressed and filtered through the lens of psychotronic film posters, specifically from the 70s and early 80s.

The FILM section of the exhibition was an eight minute video artwork titled PSYCHO VISION, which explores the unique formal qualities and ironic experimentalism of low brow, self produced media entertainment. The piece takes the form of a network broadcast, where low budget horror shorts, cheap daytime melodramas, homemade video adverts and personalised soft-core erotica are played on a perpetual loop. The video piece highlights how these strange DIY recreations foreground cinematic artifice over authenticity and relatability, thusly flattening its actors/characters into weird, cartoonish emoji-like fragments.

The MUSIC section of the exhibition was an looping hour-long radio show (named RADIO 666) dedicated to playing the latest releases from a fictitious music label called Ruber Records. Here, the musical grammar and vernaculars of electronic pop music are used to engage with notions of post-humanism, where the real and the artificial, the human and the technological, blur into one. Albums of the fake artists played on the radio show were dispalyed and bookended by a pair of bombastic music posters, reminiscent of techno posters and paste-ups from the 90s and early 2000s.

Additionally, a text titled Scat-tera/tology: A User's Guide was published by Trocadero Art Space, which elucidated many of the themes underlining the exhibtion, as well as further articulating the scat-tera/tological approach to cultural analysis and artistic reasearch. The text was made available on the Troc Talks website in the led up to and during the exhibtion.