BADEN PAILTHORPE FORMATIONS

BADEN PAILTHORPE FORMATIONS 26 July - 19 August 2012

© Martin Browne Contemporary © All images copyright Baden Pailthorpe This catalogue is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. COMPILER: Electra Foley COLOUR SEPARATIONS: Spitting Image, Sydney PRINTING: Southern Colour, Sydney ISBN: 978-0-9872516-1-9

Cover Image: Very Few Good Men, 2012, HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 2 minutes, ed. 5 + 2 AP

LIST OF WORKS Formation VII, 2012, two-channel HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 3 minutes 35 seconds, ed. 5 + 2 AP HALO, 2012, two-channel HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 2 minutes 40 seconds, ed. 5 + 2 AP Very Few Good Men, 2012, HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 2 minutes, ed. 5 + 2 AP

In his first solo exhibition with Martin Browne Contemporary, Baden Pailthorpe presents Formations, a series of three video and new media artworks that poetically subvert the politics and aesthetics of the military. Created by remixing Hollywood cinema and manipulating US military training simulators, Pailthorpe’s striking artworks make clear references to abstraction, landscape and performance – at the same time closely engaging with the classic military strategies of heightened perception, deception, camouflage and confusion. In HALO, 2012, we are party to a graceful yet helpless moment, as both a US soldier and a Taliban fighter fall from the heavens over Afghanistan. The sky in this work acts as a blind witness to their beautifully doomed flight, levelling the folly of human conflict to the sublime and eternal indifference of nature. This two-channel video work derives its title from the military acronym, High Altitude Low Opening, and describes a specialised kind of military skydive. Pailthorpe plays on the poetic resonances that the word halo conjures, wedged uncomfortably between military jargon and spiritual transcendence. Formation VII, 2012, mobilises similar visual poetry. The latest work in an ongoing series of ‘marching performances’, this two-channel video work is set within the US military’s simulated version of Afghanistan. Rather than using this training software to simulate violence or military encounter, instead Pailthorpe gives a group of soldiers the simplest of orders: walk. Through this minor gesture of resistance, a striking aesthetic of repetition from the simulator’s own code is revealed. The multiple of each individual body creates a kind of corporeal sculpture. As is prevalent in military vocabulary, reference to the collective body (such as the Marine Corps) connotes the machine-like structure and strength that follows a military formation of disciplined bodies. Perhaps the most universal and often political of human actions, walking is used by Pailthorpe as a device to uncover pockets of resistance from within even the most closed, controlled and constructed of environments: military simulations. In contrast, Very Few Good Men, 2012, appropriates footage from a classic military film and pushes it to the limits of abstraction. In this work, the traditional Marine Corps drill is subject to the brutal treatment of contemporary remix culture and its own coded discipline. Here the military becomes the target of its own aesthetic strategies of uniform, camouflage and deception as the aesthetics of military ritual are subverted, inverted, perverted and corrupted to the point of absurdity. What remains is a stunning burst of visual and sonic energy that creates its own formations of aesthetic dominance and political rite. BIOGRAPHY Baden Pailthorpe is a young Australian interdisciplinary artist whose research-based art practice spans video, photography, gaming, sound, text and installation. His work engages with the political, cultural and conceptual potential of technologies in their most diverse forms. Pailthorpe’s work has been widely exhibited and published, with close to thirty solo and group exhibitions, both in Australia and internationally. Currently, Baden Pailthorpe is a doctoral research candidate in the School of the Arts and Media at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, where he is a recipient of the prestigious Research Excellence Award and two other scholarships. His work has also been funded with grants from the Australia Council for the Arts, and the National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA).

Formation VII, 2012, two-channel HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 3 minutes 35 seconds, ed. 5 + 2 AP

To view the Formation VII preview video please CLICK HERE

Formation VII, 2012, two-channel HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 3 minutes 35 seconds, ed. 5 + 2 AP

HALO, 2012, two-channel HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 2 minutes 40 seconds, ed. 5 + 2 AP

To view the HALO preview video please CLICK HERE

HALO, 2012, two-channel HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 2 minutes 40 seconds, ed. 5 + 2 AP

Very Few Good Men, 2012, HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 2 minutes, ed. 5 + 2 AP

To view the Very Few Good Men preview video please CLICK HERE

Very Few Good Men, 2012, HD video, 16:9, colour, sound, 2 minutes, ed. 5+ 2 AP

BADEN PAILTHORPE Born 1984, Canberra, Australia Lives and works in Sydney, Australia EDUCATION Current

Doctor of Philosophy (Art, Media & Politics) The University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

2011

Master of Fine Art (Art & New Media) l’Université Paris VIII, Vincennes — Saint-Denis, Paris, France

2009

Master of Art (Photomedia) The College of Fine Arts, UNSW, Sydney, Australia

2007

Bachelor of Arts - (French Studies, Arabic & Islamic Studies) The University of Sydney, Australia

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2012

Formations, Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney, Australia

2012

Lingua Franca, Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney, Australia

2010

Twist, Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney, Australia

2010

Other v2.0, Inflight A.R.I, Hobart, Australia

2010

Other v2.0, Kings A.R.I., Melbourne, Australia

2008

Translocality, Oh Really Gallery, Sydney, Australia

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2013

Ludic Dissonance (working title), Screen Space, Melbourne, Australia (Curatorial project)

2012

Café des Espérances, Kunstfort bij Vijfhuizen, The Netherlands

2012

FILE 2012, Sao Paulo, Brazil

2012

Yes, We’re Open, The Netherlands Media Art Institute (NIMk), Amsterdam, The Netherlands

2012

HRAFF, No Vacancy Gallery, Melbourne, Australia

2012

Action Frame, Elita Milano, Teatro Franco Parenti, Milan, Italy

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS (CONTINUED) 2012

Game Change, Telfair Museum of Art, Savannah, Georgia, USA

2011

Prosume This, BEKO, Berlin, Germany

2011

Pixel Pops!, Galerie Nouvel Organon, Paris, France

2011

Poles Apart, Blindside Gallery, Melbourne, Australia

2011

Firstdraft 25, Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney, Australia

2011

Monobandes II, Les Territoires, Montréal, Canada

2011

Lingua Franca, Re-new Digital Arts Festival, Copenhagen, Denmark

2011

Twist, Games Culture Circle, HBC, Berlin, Germany

2009

Doug Moran Contemporary Photographic Prize, Online exhibition, Sydney, Australia

2009

Mugshots, Oh Really Gallery, Sydney, Australia

2009

COFA Annual, College of Fine Arts, UNSW, Sydney, Australia

2009

Winter Set, Marker Gallery, Melbourne, Australia

GRANTS AND AWARDS 2012

Curator Mentorship Initiative (with Screen Space), National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA)

2012

Research Excellence Award, Ph.D Scholarship, UNSW

2011

Faculty Top-Up Ph.D Scholarship, Arts & Social Sciences, UNSW

2011

Australian Post-Graduate Award (APA), 3 year Ph.D Scholarship, UNSW

2011

New Work (emerging) Grant, The Australia Council for the Arts, Australia

2011 1st Place, Masters by Research (Arts Plastiques), l’Université Paris VIII, France 2009 The Dean’s List for Academic Excellence, College of Fine Arts, UNSW 2009 Doug Moran Contemporary Photographic Prize (Semi-Finalist)