WHITEHOT MAGAZINE
Review by Charlene Stevens in Whitehot Magazine
https://whitehotmagazine.com/articles/weight-things-at-fridman-gallery/4155
PDF:
excerpt:
The Weight of Things, at Fridman Gallery is a work of art that must be experienced. The audio track of the rumblings of actual earthquakes allow the viewer to feel the vibrations of the earthquake depicted in the video. Sitting in the basement-level media room allows the viewer to feel not only the vibrations of the soundtrack, but also the subtle vibrations of the subway below one’s feet.
Levy’s source material, 19th century etchings of two rooms at the Palace of Versailles – the bedroom of Luis XIV and the Salle of Constantine, reduce the vibrantly colored opulent chambers, to outlines that are further reduced to piles of rubble. Watching the clearing of the rooms gives the viewer a sense of purification that one feels when watching a team of professionals clear out a hoarder’s house, revealing walls and floors hidden for years, or when Marie Kondo comes in and makes people organize their own homes. The maximalist Baroque art and decoration, further maximized by the Rococo, falls away to the stark minimalism of empty rooms and there is a feeling of relief when the earthquake purifies them.
