Jonas Mekas, "*A small table with a bottle of wine, garlic, sausage, bread*,” 2009
Courtesy of the Jonas Mekas Estate and Microscope Gallery, New York

Microscope Gallery | Dec. 8 - Jan. 21, 2023

Microscope is very pleased to present “A small table with a bottle of wine, garlic, sausage, bread,” a solo exhibition of works by Jonas Mekas, taking place on the 100th anniversary of his birth on December 24, 1922.

“A small table with a bottle of wine, garlic, sausage, bread" features Mekas’ final work “Requiem” (2019), an 84-minute video piece that, after its debut as part of a live visual/orchestral performance at The Shed in 2019, is being exhibited for the first time in its final single-channel video form. Additionally, the show includes a selection of the artist's 4- channel video installations, known as “quartets,” as well as multi-projector 35mm slide, sound, and photographic installations made between 2000 and 2018 — most of which have rarely, if ever, been presented in the United States.

Throughout his nearly 80-year-long artistic lifetime, Mekas embraced the diaristic form, arguably more than any other through cameras, sound devices, and written journals, while maintaining a radical dedication to elevating the personal and poetic aspects of daily life, always seeking to capture the essence of the moment. Mekas recorded what was happening in front of him in the present, the here and now. With an emphasis on that which is typically regarded as the small and insignificant, he was unwaveringly committed to sharing “fragments of paradise on Earth.”

To view more of this exhibition, please visit here.

Jason Hirata
*Glow*
Digital C-Print
13 x 16 ¼

Ulrik NYC | Dec. 3 - Jan. 28, 2023

Up four flights of thick and round wooden stairs sits the gallery called Ulrik behind a shaded black door. It’s more or less square, with white walls and black floors, about the size of one of the lined sections of a tennis court. It’s a corner unit. Lots of open space and light is communicated through its two windows. The built-in lighting has been shut off to make way for an artwork called “Inverted Lighting Scheme,” which replaces the overhead lights with bare white bulbs plugged into each of the room's task-level outlets. As visitors move through the space, their shadows are cast in multiple across all that occupies the room. There are a handful of photographs on the walls which are collectively named “Blaise Hirata”. Tightly framed in black, the photos are fairly dark themselves which allows their glazing to reflect much of what surrounds them. The photos are of shadows and candles; smoke; wax; flames; a lighter and a hand. Found in the shadows of the candle is the impression that its flame also casts a darkness like any other. Near the door is a work named “Komár”: an intercom that listens continuously to the street below. It’s not loud, and there’s not always action down there. Mostly it transmits the sound of air, engines, the occasional car horn, and bits of conversation in passing, but it’s likely that anything is possible on West 17th street. Finally, there is a white desk with two chairs, which holds a few papers and cards, and a folder that contains a financial contract. That contract is a loan from the artist to the gallery, and an artwork titled “The Borrowers”.

To view more of this exhibition, please visit here.