Crapping on the Cremaster - at Artspace

Lucy RAVED about this on monday

here are official details - for Post Barney vidoe art - by Martin Sastre (actually I prefer his take on the new world order )


MARTIN SASTREHOLA AUSTRALIA!the iberoamerican trilogy
The Iberoamerican Trilogy, a recent video project by Uruguayan artist, Martin Sastre, is an ironic and humorous commentary on the international art scene, from the eyes of a Latin American artist trying to establish himself in the mainstream art world. The Iberoamerican Trilogy recounts the future of the planet beginning with the fall of Hollywood and the creation of a new order – the Iberoamerican Axis. When the world finally becomes known by its real name: The Third World.Part 1> Videoart: The Iberoamerican Legend (2002) is a high-art history lesson, in which Sastre blames the death of video art on Matthew Barney – and claims a profitable afterlife for himself. With the aim of restructuring the grand narratives & their audiences, Martin Sastre begins by presenting a frozen narrator from the end of time. The Iberoamerican Legend is the story of a Latin American who tells true lies and exhibits a handful of bizarre fetish / cult objects for an era that doesn’t know what to worship anymore.Part 2> Montevideo: The Dark Side of The Pop (2004) set in the year 2092 follows a teenage prodigy who is sent to Montevideo by the ‘European Centre of Intelligence,’ to find out the secret behind Martin Sastre’s success. As everybody knows behind every success there is always a secret, a pact. In following the route of this Uruguayan artist the teenage investigator discovers a deserted capital city, a forgotten place in far South America that could be hiding more than a simple secret of success, an occidental experiment that could be a vision of the future European Union.Part 3> Bolivia: The American Videoclip (2004) recounts the Iberoamerican era: the third world in the year 2792, soon after the natural disasters unleashed by the wars for natural resources, when the world was divided into large political blocks: BOLIVIA: The Iberoamerican Confederation of Nations; CHINORUSSIA: The The Chinorussian Empire with its twin capitals of Moscow and Beijing; INDIA: The Kingdom of India; The African Economic Community: Including its European colonies; Sub America: Small independent republics without natural resources which were previously part of the United States of America. And other smaller countries including – The KINGDOM OF ENGLAND; The PRINCIPALITY OF SWITZERLAND; The HELLO KITTY EMPIRE: The former Japanese Empire; The KYLIE and MURIEL ISLANDS: previously known as Australia.
Martin Sastre was born in Montevideo in 1976 and lives in Madrid. In the last four years Sastre has become one of the most known video artists from South America, having participated in the XXVI Bienal de Sao Paulo, Brazil 2004 and the VIII Bienal de la Habana, Cuba 2003. His most recent solo shows include: 'Diana Lives', Grande Scuola di San Teodoro, Rialto Venecia, Italy; 'Martin Sastre, American As Well' Site Gallery, Sheffield and Stills Gallery Edinburgh, UK, and 'The Iberoamerican Trilogy', Art in General, New York.He is the honorary President of The Martin Sastre Foundation for the Super Poor Arta web-based project to build a new South American Art Field.

Art Space aslo has the ingtriguing - post paint paint based concept piece by STEPHEN LITTLE + NIKE SAVVAS called a Million Suns http://www.artspace.org.au/2005/07/little_savvas.html
I couldn't reproduce the purple prose here - it got the award for spewerama trie hard lyricism - but I rekcon the work itself is OK.

the other piece is Sweet Barrier Reef by KEN YONETANI - the workd are kind of minimalist but the intent is great - but got blasted away by Sastre. I'll go back for a pie and a ponder next week

Sweet Barrier Reef focuses on the event of bleaching coral. Coral bleaching refers to the process leading to coral death. River waters containing high levels of suspended sediment (nitrogen, phosphorus and herbicides) cause coral death and bleaching. This sediment often comes from harvesting sugarcane, and is known to be one factor leading to bleaching in the Great Barrier Reef. In fact, many large sugarcane fields are located beside coral reefs, leading to coral damage in places across the globe. In this project, Yonetani focuses on this impact by creating a reef of sugar. Yet here, sugar is used as a much larger metaphor, questioning the environmental impact of our desire to consume.More broadly, Yonetani's work seeks to focus on all causes of human impact that lead to coral death. Presently the most significant factor of coral bleaching and danger to coral is posed by global warming. Abnormal rises in sea temperatures lead to massive coral damage in vast areas. Coral is a very sensitive animal and cannot tolerate a rise of even one or two degrees in sea temperature. It can be classified into one of the animals that are easily damaged with human impact, such as a result of climate change, over-fishing and water pollution.Yonetani has been investigating this relationship between human desires and environmental issues in his previous works. In this project too, sugar becomes a metaphor of human desire. Sugar is also a symbol of “Westernisation”, “modernisation” and “consumerism”. This may be related to the intimate relation between colonial history and sugar plantations. Yonetani has built on his work “Sugar project-Underwater” to produce a much larger work, inspired by the vision of the massive coral colonies within the Great Barrier Reef."Coral reefs are the most species-rich marine ecosystem on Earth. Tens of thousands of species have evolved to co-exist in coral reefs, each species with its own unique shape and its own role in the ecosystem. Coral reefs have evolved to their present form over millions of years, continuously responding to changes. Nevertheless, these living underwater treasures are easily damaged. Unprecedented pressures from global climate change, agricultural and urban runoff, and over-fishing have severely degraded many coral reefs over the last 20 years. Concerted decisive action is needed to reduce air and water pollution, and to establish and support marine reserves, in order to protect these living underwater treasures into the future."Dr. Katharina Fabricius, Reef EcologistAustralian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS)