Obsolescence and reinvention: the case study of João Maria Gusmão and Pedro Paiva

Abstract

The current research is based on the debate related to Media Archaeology — through concepts such as zombie media (Hertz and Parikka 2012) and obsolescence (Elsaesser 2018) — and artistic historiography — reinvention (Krauss 1999a, 1999b) — to analyse the production of the Portuguese artistic duo João Maria Gusmão and Pedro Paiva. Choosing as fundamental works to reflect about such conceptions the recent pieces Pôr do Sol, Camelos no Egipto, Torneira, Quadrado branco a saltar sobre quadrado verde, Neve and Laranja Verde (2017-2018), we intend to investigate how the two artists break with the logic of common use of the devices. Taking into account their previous projects, mostly based on the reactivation of obsolete mechanisms, such as 16mm films, Gusmão and Paiva continue to reflect on a pre-digital notion of the image. The pieces selected for this investigation constitute a set of fixed-image projectors, presented as a single installation. However, after their original systems have been changed (hacking), they simulate an idea of animated image. These pieces refer to an archaeological dimension of the principles of cinema and the first optical devices, such as magic lanterns, recreating an immersive environment and discussing the observer’s perception and body in relation to the exhibition space. It recovers an experience of enchantment through the large planes of color, the analogical illusion of movement and the temporal fiction. As a strategy of comparative analysis, other examples in the artistic field will be evoked such as the practice of the artists Francisco Tropa and Rosângela Rennó.