Joe Jagos

PARAPHIAL

SPRING/BREAK ART SHOW 2013

SPRING/BREAK

The multidisciplinary installation entitled: PARAPHIAL, is a result of a collaborative effort between artists Joseph Jagos and Sadaf H. Nava. Proximity, intimacy, the photographic image as both subject, object and body are brought together in two lit self portraits within a mirror-like installation. Objects duplicate each other physically and conceptually. The two plants and abstracted torsos mimic disguised flesh covered by artificial flesh. The female form looked at through the photographic graininess of closeup leather becomes cosmic and galactic, lit up and contained within a larger frame. The headless body confronts the viewer with proximity and at the same time provides distance and illusionary recondition of the subject it depicts.

The culturally specific images of fetish-ware, of headless statues, of classical nudes and of the democratization of eroticism are merged together and interchangeable. A transformation and confusion of the body, seen simultaneously through worship and degradation also comes into play architecturally. The space resembles both an alter and a red-light district store-front. Domesticated plants are covered with a different species of plant-life decoratively illuminating an unnatural or fabricated idea of nature. The mass produced objectification or repression of sexual desire. Different layers of spectatorship in relation to the body confront the viewer with familiar yet displaced materials. Placed in a narrow hallway where, organisms mimic themselves relationally as well as spatially through the folds of leather, pvc, and mesh. The body plasticizing a universal form through classical methods.

Photography:

Sadaf H Nava

Photo Light Encasements and Electronics:

Joseph Jagos

Mirror Piece:

Joseph Jagos