Karthik Pandain

Karthik Pandain's installation, Before the Sun, at Midway Art Gallery was a piece that required a lot of outside information to understand. The actual installation comprised of two square glass pillars both about 6 feet tall supporting vintage 16mm video recorders. The pillars stood on a platform about 10 feet across made out of sand and dirt. The film captured archaeological dips at Indian mounds in Illinois. At first the room in which the display was held was disorientating, it was very dark and the videos playing were seen at two opposite corners in the crevices of adjacent walls. The images were ambiguous, only a sunrise or sunset with silhouettes of people randomly crossing the screen. After our guide explained what the film was depicting and that the film was being rotated on wires across the ceiling, the piece gained meaning. Contemporary art relies mostly on background information, without it the viewer (in my case) loses interest in the possible pretensions of this type of obscure art.

Before the Sun and After

Before the Sun, at first an elusive name hanging somewhere in the dirty haze of a dark room, comes to light (literally, as your eyes adjust to the sudden darkness, it appears in front of you) as you enter the painted doors of the Midway Contemporary Art building. Though it is hard to pin point the focus of such a piece, I would elect the film loops in either corner as the president experiences in the room. With the sun rising in the eastern corner film, showing joggers and others going about their routines on the historical mounds just outside of St. Louis, you can follow with your eyes the film strip running above the projection, across the ceiling through the wire grid (much like that of an archaeological dig marking system) and into the western projection of the setting sun. Between the quite hum of the 16 mm film running along the ceiling and the recorded sound effects playing along with the films displayed on the eastern and western corners of the room one would feel almost inclined to curl up on the massive, stage-like dirt mound in the center of the room and attempt to take in the odd combination of sensory effects. The harsh darkness, the repetitious films on either side of the viewer, the smell of the sand-and-clay mound you would most likely either sit or stand on and the calamity of just a few sounds echoing in the strange acoustics make for a pleasantly bizarre experience, definitely worth a visit.

Karthic Pandian, the artist of the exhibit, is a contemporary artist from LA, who holds both and MFA and a BA and has shown work all over the country.

Before the Sun

Before the Sun by Karthik Pandian is both literally and figuratively captivating. As you begin to enter the Midway Contemporary Art building where his instillation is located the first thing you will notice is...nothing. There is no light except for flickering images projected on opposite walls coming from two 16mm cameras. This is pretty exciting at first, because you have no idea what's going on because you can't see anything, and there are plenty of places to trip and fall on your face. As your eyes adjust, everything begins to fall into place.

Pandian has created an entrancing piece of artwork focusing mainly on archeology and architecture. It is based and filmed from the top of a Native American "Cohokia Mound," which are massive pre-Coloumbus era mounds created by laboriously and repetitively transferring dirt in baskets located near modern day St Louis. The installment consists of a large four-sided platform made of a mixture of sand, clay, and seashells. Mounted on the top are the two 16mm cameras facing back to back from each other. Each camera container is filled with earth, which in turn helps hold the whole glass camera container together.

The whole thing could just as easily be mistakenly called "After the Sun" as "Before the Sun," because one camera is looping film clips of the sun rising (which is actually facing east), and the other is looping clips of the sun setting (facing west). As you watch you can see clips of people running, walking, and biking by on top of these mounds. Sound effects which at first seem a bit creepy and random but soon make sense when explained are also spliced in. The most prominent of these are the scraping noise of an archaeologist searching through the dirt for ancient treasures and a loud crack from a firecracker.

What really helps pull the whole atmosphere of the piece together is the quality of the film loops. The rolls of film are supported (and are probably even being continually damaged a little) by a suspended network of red twine, giving it an old-timey feel. This twine is made in the exact fashion of many archaeological digs, which hints at the connection between past and present people and structural forms.

Karthic Pandian is a contemporary artist working and living in Los Angeles, California. He has had work featured all over the United States, and holds a MFA and a BA.

Before the Sun by Karthik Pandain

Karthik Pandian is an artist living and working in Los Angelous, California. His work has been shown in numerous exhibitions and his films have been showcased in museums and exhibitions as well. His MFA is from Art Center College of Design and his BA is from Brown University.

Karthik Pandian’s solo exhibition Before the Sun is on display at Midway Contemporary Art from September 18^th through November 6^th, 2010. This exhibition combines with film and architecture to create a unique sort of art that is more of a verb then a noun. This piece is a verb because it is an idea and an experience.

The structure of the piece is packed earth transported here and molded into a perfectly proportional square platform, with a smaller square platform on top to form two steps. Atop these platforms are two glass columns housing 16mm film projectors. These projects play a loop of film, one column playing the sunrise, one playing the sunset. These projections are pointed in the eastern and western corners of the gallery.

Additional details of the piece that make it an experience is the audio and extras in the film. The audio includes sound captured from the site of the film which is accompanied by the scraping of an archeologist’s tools and, at the end of the loop, a loud crack from a firework. The films also feature the shadows of people as they shuffle in front of the camera, sometimes alone, and sometimes with children. Their footsteps are part of the audio, though muffled mostly by the digging noises.

Image from: http://www.southwillard.com/page/37

Karthik Pandain -- Before the Sun

Pandain's subject matter in his instillation is strongly symbolic of his interests and what inspires him to do art. When I first looked at the instillation, I nothing stirred me enough to see the inspiration behind it, I felt indifferent. Then, after the instillation was explained to me, and after reading about it afterwards, it became more and more beautiful. The instillation comprised of multiple pieces that made the instillation work together harmoniously. First, the base in the instillation was made of dirt, sand, and metal that was inspired by the Cahokia Mounds, which are Colombian Native American structures that Pandain studied, and is also significant in itself because the four corners of the structure are a path of the sun through the sky and faces the four cardinal directions, or like a compass- facing North, South, East, and West. In the mound stand two identical mirror-pane glass pillars filled with sand to hold the projectors that are in the pillars. The projectors show film that runs on a loop that is looped around the ceiling and is rubbed by twine so when the film is projected, the film has apparent scratches. The film itself is sixteen millimeters and shows footage of the sunrise and sunset of the apex of Monk's Mound, with added noise of an archeological work site. The films last about two minutes, and the film is supported by an archeological grid of a red twine that archeologists use to help map out findings.

The media Pandain uses is variable, but fits into the same category based on is inspiration and his interest in archeology. He uses twine for the archeological mapping grid on the ceiling with red twine, and also uses twine for scratching the surface of the film as it loops through the grid on the ceiling. For the base, he uses compacted dirt, sand, and metal. He also uses sand to fill the glass boxes to hold the projectors up. He also uses sixteen millimeter film.

Pandain uses form very accurately when it comes to his research and how he set up his instillation. The base represents the Cahokia Mounds that he researched in downtown Chicago, and is suppose to look like a mound, and the corners of the mound face the four cardinal directions, which in other words is supposed to be the directions of a compass, facing North, South, East, and West. This also correlates with the film and where the glass box pillars are set, because the footage is of a sunrise and a sunset, so the film footage is appropriately placed to where the cardinal directions are. color is used for the film, and the color of the red twine on the ceiling is very abrupt and in contrast to the white ceiling, and also supports the looping film that enters and exits the projectors in the glass pillars. The film is being supported by twine, thus the support of this creates friction by the film and the twine, creating a texture to the film and exposing scratches to the film, and making the film look antique, fitting with the archeological theme of the instillation. Light is used very well in this instillation because the projectors of the footage are the only source of light in the instillation, making the main focus the motion pictures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hhRyC3coZl4

Karthik Pandian, an artist from Los Angeles, is a diverse artist but apparently does a lot of work in 16mm projection installation which describes perfectly the exhibit, "Before the Sun," seen last Thursday. Pandian's current interest in archaeology, architecture, and research of the Cahokia mounds has had a huge influence in the project and can even go as far to call it the theme.

The installation found at the Midway Contemporary Art Exhibit is an installation piece that is quite bothersome to those with allergies and fear of the dark. (Of which I may

or may not exhibit both of those features.) Upon entering the exhibit, which is the same as entering the building, one finds the lights have been shut off to accompany the 16mm projections facing two corners of the room, one showing sunrise over the Cahokia mounds and one showing sunsets. (Clever? Well art should be shouldn't it?) In the center of the dark mass is a stepped plaza made of earth itself. (Just waiting to cause dirty butts to unsuspecting/blind victims.) The sides of the plaza are facing cardinal direc

tions.

Buried in the plaza are two pristinely cut glass pillars that house the projectors sitting atop another mass of earth (sand) that also fills the glass pillars. The film loops around magenta twine that is hung above the installation in a grid fashion. This choice to allow the film to cross the twine not only degrades the film (and bring awesome antique-like aesthetics) but also feeds into Pandian's love of automatic creation.

The exhibit itself I found could only appeal to me through further investigation which may in fact lead right into Pandian's love of archaeology. The only shock factor in

my own observation came from the dark room. Otherwise I was left with questions of everything going on. Only upon the guide's explanation were my questions answered and my need to find artist's intent found. As much as I loved the exhibit and it's simplicity, my favorite part of the exhibit had to be the accidental camera obscura.

Thank you for your time,

chuck..

Before the Sun

Karthik Pandian is a contemporary artist who lives and Los Angeles, he has several exhibitions set up nation wide, his piece Before the Sun finds it’s home at Midway Contemporary Art in Minneapolis, Minnesota. This particular exhibition mixes an archaeological dig for the old with a contemporary flair of architecture for the new. Walking in to Pandain’s exhibition is an experience in itself, after an adjustment to the lack of light the focus shifts to two small projections in opposite corners of the room.

The projection in the eastern corner of the room (about 2 by 3 feet) shows a repeating film of the sun rising at an archeological dig in St. Louise, Illinois. Occasionally people will pass by the camera through the clips of film. At the opposite end of the room, in the western corner, the projection shows clips with people walking in front of the setting sun at the same site. This series of clips ends with a firework and a loud crack. This may be a symbol of the end.

The center of the room is filled by a two level platform facing the cardinal directions. The platform is made of sand and clay, and sprinkled with seashells. Two 16mm film projectors are set up facing out to the east and west corners. The projects sit on sand in clean-cut, contemporary shaped, glass columns.

The structure built in the center or the room, along with the contemporary glass cases, combined with projections of the dig and archaeological grid lines show Pandian’s love of bringing old elements to modern life. His interest in archaeology shines through his film loops and suggests the relation from the past into current architecture.