2013 | Rolls of pink and white papers, projected images
In the 1939 film version of The Wizard of Oz, a tornado blows away Dorothy’s home from a sepia-tinted farm in Kansas, and lands it in the Land of Oz. The cinematic Oz exists in bright Technicolor, where everything is amplified and glows in supernatural colors.
Levy’s playground is essentially identical to the cinematic Oz: a territory where stimulation is boosted with artificial materials and color. An image of cloud-littered skies is projected on a pink screen, similar to shooting against a studio background. The screen paints the clouds in sweet pink as the full moon moves slowly around, tagging the viewer.
Levy creates an environment that strives to be a spectacular, a singular show of color. It is a work of seduction that draws on a worn universe of cliché images, scraps of empty promises, and elusive objects of unattainable desire that create an illusion of control of nature, beauty and destiny.
Our longing for the transcendental stems from our anxiety of finiteness. The allure of Levy’s work is stems from this same undermined sense of confidence, compelling us to linger a moment longer, to willingly submit to a scant handful of extended time in artificial beauty and a failed hope for a Technicolor life. No matter how distant we are from each other, we can always lift our heads up toward the fake moon and know that a happy end lies ahead.
The CDA's archives are operating with the support of the Ostrovsky Family Fund and Artis
