The Infinite Mix is an eclectic video art exhibition that draws you into an immersive soulful experience. The ten art works in The Infinite Mix take the shape of different formats such as 3D films, holographic illusions and immersive video. They cut (not clearly) across a variety of genres from music video to documentary film. You will find yourself with a blend of art, music and documentaries like you have never experienced before.
The Infinite Mix: Contemporary Sound and Image is an exhibition that showcases and brings together various audio-visual art pieces. It will be the first major off-site event the Hayward gallery is staging. They are collaborating with the Vinyl Factory to present this mix in The Store, 180 The Strand, a former empty and disused space that has now morphed into a new and creative hub for art, style and culture.
With Martin Creed, accompanied by a pop song written and performed by him, you are taken through a portrayal of various ways people use their body with some walking, hopping, crawling or literally dragging themselves across a NY street. Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster takes you through a derelict, dark and resounding corridor as she plays Maria Callas in a haunting, holographic illusion lip-syncing arias from Cherubini’s Medea, Verdi’s La Traviata and Ponchielli’s La Gioconda. With Luanda Kinshahsha, artist Stan Douglas takes you back to the 70s with his depiction of a jazz band at a recording studio in a six-hour session of improvised afro punk rock.
Bom Bom, a tiny Japanese dancer with fantastic, gymnastic dancehall moves is the star of a CGI-filled semi-documentary from Jeremy Deller in collaboration with Cecilia Bengolea. It takes you through her adventures as she journeys to Jamaica to take part in the local dancehall scene. Cyprien Gaillard owns the basement of The Store with Nightlife, his 3D film and audio installation. With your 3D glasses, you get to immerse yourself in traumatic history with fireworks and dancing plant life looming out at you. Cameron Jamie delivers an erotic piece with young black men humping furniture in massage of the History.
Kahlil Joseph’s 2014 M.A.A.D’s response to Kendrick Lamar’s M.A.A.D city is a double-screen collage that takes you on a tour of Compton showing violence, police brutality, hip-hop and poverty. Elizabeth Price in ‘K’, her double screen installation simultaneously shows you an animation of a machine weaving and packaging yellow nylon stockings and the Kyrstals, professional mourners performing rituals at funerals and other events.
Everything and More by Racheal Rose is a poignant and sad interview with US astronaut, David Wolf narrating his experience of looking down from space on the earth and finally coming back. Finally, Ugo Rondinone in his immersive installation, features legendary John Giorno performing ‘Thanx 4 Nothing’. It is an emotion-laden poem in which John looks back on his whole life, and is a farewell to a career and a “thank you for nothing” to the people who came through his life.
The contents of the art works do not only entertain but they provoke you into deep thinking with their presentation of riotous histories and cultural tensions. You will feel all the emotions, the passion and love of the pieces as you immerse yourself in them. You experience each piece individually with none leaking over to the other. This is art, expanding and remixing the way you experience sound and moving images, exposing you to a unique and interesting experience of an infinite mix. Lose yourself in it.