[van-announce] Protest/Media: Paintings, Prints & 1 inch Buttons by Chris Bentzen

[announcements at resist.ca]

Protest/Media: Paintings, Prints & 1 inch Buttons by Chris Bentzen 

Where:
spaces gallery, 148 alexander street, vancouver bc 778.882.6278

When:
Thursday, 8th of January 2004 from 7:00 PM until approximately 10:00 PM

Cost: Free

You're invited to "Protest/Media: Paintings, Prints & 1 inch Buttons by 
Chris Bentzen" opening January 8 @ 7pm – w/ DJ Niall (Mondays @ The 
Morrissey) spinning 80's punk and new wave.
Show runs January 8-25, 2004
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About The Show
The relationship between protesters and the media has always been difficult. 
On the one hand, the protester wants his or her cause to be known while on the 
other, he or she doesn't want to be portrayed as an ignorant fool unaware of 
how the world works. More often than not, the media focuses on the more 
aggressive members of a protest while the majority goes unnoticed and so the 
message is lost. Think about the APEC protest at UBC or the WTO protest in 
Seattle and most people will remember pepper spray and fences falling at UBC 
and smashed Starbucks and McDonalds windows in Seattle. The media 
certainly didn't focus on the bigger picture as well as they did on more 
violent aspects of the protests despite the supposedly objective, almost 
invisible role they're meant to play.

In Protest/Media, Chris Bentzen explores the relationship between 
protesters and the media. The media is represented as outlined figures, 
transparent yet visible reporters and cameras fill the landscape. The 
protesters are hidden in the background, unless of course they're wearing 
balaclavas – a dead giveaway that something newsworthy will happen (just 
keep the cameras rolling!).

>From 6-foot canvas down to 1-inch buttons, Protest/Media also contrasts scale. 
Larger than life reporters and protesters vie for your attention while the 
smaller works may be overlooked. The small scale is where the message is, on 
the sweater of the protester or in the corner of the gallery; sometimes only 
the bigger picture is noticed. Smaller scale works also comes together in a 
larger context: small individual prints depicting reporters are placed 
together to become a large-scale work, in opposition to a single protester.

Overall, this show utilizes the vernacular of the street: a stencil-graffiti style, 
punk rock buttons, an unpolished aesthetic. There is no effort made to be 
realistic: in the same way the news about protests isn't always realistic 
and in the same way protests are always a little rough around the edges.

-----

For more information:
Erin
err_in at hotmail.com
(604)253.0197
www.spacesvancouver.com

  



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