Shadow Pool 11.1620
11

A Natural History of The San San International

Reposted from LOOKBOOKS.COM
by Price Latimer Agah 

For the Los Angeles-based collaborative duo, Jonah Freeman and Justin Lowe, their art practice consists of much more than two-dimensional work hung on a gallery wall. Shadow Pool: A Natural History of The San San International (presented by MOCA), their latest in a series of mind-bending, kaleidoscopic multi-disciplinary installations, premiered last Wednesday, November 9, 2011 at the Masonic Lodge in Hollywood Forever Cemetery (final resting spot of Cecil B. DeMille, Jayne Mansfield, Rudolph Valentino, Douglas Fairbanks, Dee Dee Ramone and other Hollywood stars). Part histrionic slide lecture, part theatrical happening and part Mad-Max-meets-Edie-Sedgwick fashion show (a collaboration with costume designers Jhordan Dahl and Katie Casey), the fantastical production culminated with a glorious noise performance by iconic rock ‘n roller Jennifer Herrema and her band Black Bananas, replete with smoke machines and models outfitted in custom sartorial paraphernalia. Jonah Freeman’s deadpan, witty discourse on the San San International (a fictitious mega-convention of epic proportions) had the oft-too-cool crowd of art aficionados, museum trustees and fashionistas cracking up throughout the evening. Freeman and Lowe’s works are both self-referential and prophetic in their examinations, with excerpts and allusions to their past large-scale environmental installations, as well as future projects. Lowe states, “This was the first time that it had ever really manifested itself on the scale that we wanted to, with the amount of people and props and additional kinds of media, like with the band… so this very much has and will continue to inform our next installation.”

The former studio mates (and longtime friends) definitively captured the art world’s attention in 2008 with their obsessively-detailed installation Hello Meth Lab in the Sun at Ballroom Marfa. On their collaborative practice, Lowe adds, “Working together allows you to do more than what you would be able to do by yourself. You can divide and conquer. We both have different strong points and can assist each other with those to produce more work in a shorter amount of time.” A variation entitled Hello Meth Lab With A View then traveled to The Station in Miami, produced by Eleanor Cayre, and co-curated by Shamim Momin and Nate Lowman. Black Acid Co-Op was installed in 2009 at Deitch Projects, NYC and consisted of a twenty-three room architectural intervention. In 2010, Bright White Underground was commissioned by Country Club and installed in R.M. Schindler’s J.J. Buck House in Hollywood, reimagining the history of this famous modernist house as the controversial site of psychedelic research. The duo currently has a sculptural commission, The Double Bind: Selections From the Annabel Vale Archive, on view at The Standard, Downtown LA.

photo credits (below): 1. Jay Carroll, 2. Jason Yates, 3. Price Latimer Agah, 4. Price Latimer Agah, 5. Price Latimer Agah, 6. Price Latimer Agah, 7. Price Latimer Agah, 8.Mason Poole, 9. Price Latimer Agah, 10. Sage Seb