A man wearing a mask of his own face with slightly misaligned eyelids sits on a stool in front of a reddish-orange background and takes off his hat.
Artist plays with constructed realities in 'POSTURING' exhibition at Minneapolis Institute of Art
University of Minnesota MFA graduate Joshua McGarvey uses a copy of a copy of the famous "Doryphoros" in the show.
July 21, 2022 at 10:00AM
"Thanks for having me," he says, speaking to an interviewer. The man dramatically removes his glasses and the camera zooms in.
In the nearly 20-minute video interview, parodying an artist profile video, the artist rambles about the making of the video and randomly reveals intimate information about himself, speaking in a slow, dubbed voice.
This piece is one of six in artist Joshua McGarvey's exhibition "POSTURING," opening Saturday at the Minneapolis Institute of Art. The interdisciplinary artist's work centers on the abstraction of truth and constructed realities and personality — often utilizing tricks from reality TV.
A scanned copy of the Pentelic marble "Doryphoros" sculpture, which an Italian court has ruled that Mia must return because it was illegally excavated in the 1970s, is usually on view in the museum, but now a copied version and a video of a sad-looking punching bag greet visitors to the exhibition.
"'Doryphoros' is one of the first examples of contrapposto, which is the projection of emotion in inanimate objects, and being able to manipulate the context of what it is," McGarvey said. "And then the fact that was like a copy of a copy and now another copy, you can kind of start to play into what like simulacra is — being lost in what the real is, or the construction of the real."
In the video "Studio Visit" — across from "Untitled 001," a video of a unicorn toy slowly being covered in green paint — McGarvey is in his garage when he gets a "random" visit from a guy walking his three-legged white poodle in the alley.
After the man enters and sits down, the garage door closes and the background becomes a lake at night. As the conversation becomes increasingly strange, it's unclear whether the encounter was random or staged.
"There are mechanisms that are used in reality TV that fool people and make people believe this is totally real," he said. "These layers will make people maybe start to question what the reality of it is."
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Joshua McGarvey: POSTURING
When: July 23-Oct. 30
Where: Minneapolis Institute of Art, 2400 3rd Av. S.
Hours: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tue., Wed., Fri.-Sun.; 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Thu.
Info: new.artsmia.org or 612-870-3000.
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