CHRISTIAN MARCLAY | MEMENTO (UB40)

Paula Cooper Gallery, New York

cf. Cyanotypes: Christian Marclay (Zurich, 2011), pl. 34

In his 2008 series Memento, Marclay contemporizes the 19th-century cyanotype technique to beguilingly beautiful result. By recording the unravelling of cassette tapes across a monumental blue expanse, an outmoded format for listening to music received one final airing. The swags and tangles of unspooled tape bring to mind 1940s and ‘50s gestural abstraction. Its monochromatic palette points toward 1960s and ‘70s minimalism, while Marclay's musical selections are decidedly 1980s and '90s in orientation. This particular work is dedicated to the British pop/reggae band UB40, a radio staple in the 1980s.