photos by Alexis Karl
ALEXIS KARL: The Exquisite Inevitable
November 9 to December 16, 2023
Opening Reception: Thursday November 9 from 6pm to 9pm
THE EXQUISITE INEVITABLE is an immersive, sensory -driven, site-specific installation created by artist Alexis Karl. What began as a horror movie set for the artist-film maker’s upcoming urban folk horror feature, ANTON- based on a forest overtaking an apartment, and hand-fabricated in the artist’s own apartment, has come to Olfactory Art Keller Gallery for a re-imagining of its filmic, arboreal roots.
The installation is an aromatic, sonic and tactile experience: fabricated trees are rooted to a moss and dirt forest floor where we see an unsettling tableau of an eternally playing record player covered in forest debris, and lounger overtaken with live moss and plants. Sounds of the forest mix with that of opera and machine hum as the needle of the record player skips like a heartbeat. We find Impossible creatures in various states of decay across our path through the space and upon a petrified wooden alter in an adjacent room that offers along with the creatures, potion bottles, ritual hybrid skulls nestled amidst ritualistic vessels encrusted with semi-precious stones, bones and teeth. These are filled with isolated scents of animal musk and decay, creating a heady atmosphere along with the verdant green notes of leaves, flower stems, deep earthy moss and dirt.
The installation asks the visitors to walk into a rather sinister post human world- one which is verdant with new growth that insistently displaces the decaying remnants of one unseen character’s lonely life. We come across a dirt-encrusted coffee mug, reading glasses and decomposing books, their pages full of indecipherable messages stained with dirt and forest mold- all notes the past. As such, the Exquisite Inevitable is a haunting, an echo of humanity where overgrown flora is in the relentless process of regrowth.
In a play between real and artifice, essences are extracted from all natural forest materials-mushrooms, bark, moss, dried and fresh leaves, seed pods, acorns and dirt, which are then are soaked into the ground moss in a fecund balance of decay and new growth. The resonance of the film set still vibrates with cinematic life, yet, as opposed to watching a screen, the visitors are asked to be part of the story: walking a pathway of disintegrating rugs, ducking under low hanging vines heavy with Spanish moss, peering in between large tree trunks… creating a surreal atmosphere. The natural aromatic elements secure a sense of the truth, while certain tactile moments, like the fabricated bark of the trees, and thick hanging vines, are elements that question the reality of the space the artist is creating, ultimately asking what is real and what is not.