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Thomas Hirschhorn - Laundrette, 2001
The
French title, feminine in gender, for what in America is referred to in
the harsher sounding Laundromat, carries a sense of nurturing, of return
to the basics, of the equalization that occurs when distinctions fade in
the humdrum environment of fulfilling the basic tasks of life. Here, however,
using commonplace materials as cardboard, linoleum, postage tape and aluminum
foil, Hirschhorn creates a political placard that confronts us with our
self-absorption in daily life functions while in the world around us pain,
fear and callousness to humanity abounds. Rather than dirty laundry, soap
suds and functional washers and dryers, the eyes of the machines frame screens
with videos of the artist as he gluts on fries and blood red catsup, pours
cokes, one of the most extensively used commercial products, down a latrine,
and examines the underside of a car, juxtaposed to internet downloads from
a French TV documentary degraded over the years by several generations of
re-recordings. Scenes appear of firing squads, mutilation and decomposing
bodies. Cutouts from supermarket tabloids, muscle magazines, ladies journals,
home made advertisements and gossip columns adorn the walls and tables while
a five part model of Marxist history rims the walls, laying the blame for
world atrocities and inequities at the doorstep of capitalist excesses.
In a corner of the Laundrette hangs a shelf offering philosophical/political texts by Nietzsche, Spinoza, Klein, Popper, and Deleuze.and topped by Felix Guatarri's Capitalism and Schizophrenia. The texts offer approaches to resolve the inequities of life but the informed viewer is faced with the knowledge of the failures of the proposed governmental forms in the face of human greed and wantonness. There is a marked absence of religious data in this cathedral of cleansing. Rather, what confront the viewers are both basic as well as existential questions raised by the visual data: the values of/the value of life, social responsibility, and the danger of excesses, personal fears and global needs. There are no conclusions here, no resolutions.
"As Hirschhorn has said: “Art doesn’t give satisfaction. Art poses problems. Art gives questions. Art inflicts sadness.” …Hirschhorn knows that something precious is slipping from our grasp, and we might not be in time to save it."
-Tom Morton, Frieze, London, Oct. 2001
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