Untitled (Breathless)

2000

Ian Wallace

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Untitled (Breathless) presents a folded newspaper article on Jean-Luc Godard’s À Bout de Souffle (Breathless). The work uses collage techniques—it is stapled down and has a thick strip of contact sheet paper taped over it—that convert the media coverage on Godard’s film into a filmic object itself. The black paper enacts a kind of cinematic “jump cut” on the article, while simultaneously drawing attention to the medium of the film, as well as the photograph reproduced in this newspaper article. The composition has a casual and dynamic stylishness to it (as do the movie stars lying in bed), which is contradicted somewhat by the static utilitarian aesthetic of the piece’s construction. The tape and staples hold the more dominant visual elements in place and recall printmaking tools.

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British-born and Vancouver-based, Ian Wallace is known for his conceptual art practice and critical writings. Since the mid-1980s, the artist has explored the relationship between documentary photography—often featuring sites of urban development—and abstract monochrome painting, to investigate the characteristics of media-specificity and the limitations of representation.

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Colors:

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• cut.n.02
• utilitarian.s.01
• juxtaposition.n.01
• newspaper.n.01
• godard.n.01
• film.n.02
• photo-conceptualism
• conceptual photography
• vancouver school
• appropriation art
• canadian
• conceptual art
• cultural commentary
• british