The show is down now, but it was such a pleasure to walk into Pace/MacGill’s Social Media exhibition and not have to get frustrated about all the work that was overlooked for a show. That is, even though one could imagine dozens of other possible projects, at least it was a strong selection of work whose creators had a history and weren’t just dabblers. David Byrne’s imaginary apps fell short for me, but the “kodak” photo frames for Democracy in Action were a perfect way to “share” his YouTube fascinations (or his assistant’s?). Other work was stronger, however. Christopher Baker’s Murmur Study with its cascading receipt tapes of twitter hashtags perfectly captures the torrent of the information age in all its glory and waste. Aram Bartholl’s Google Portraits are also pitch perfect renditions of the QR code moment. It will be interesting to see whether they retain their funhouse magic in a year or more. Now if only the curators had included someone like Mark Lombardi….
#neversatisfied