SUSANNE VIELMETTER LOS ANGELES PROJECTS

Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects is pleased to present “Sick-Amour”, a solo exhibition of new work by Joel Tauber.  In his work, Tauber explores elemental philosophical questions about our relationships to nature and the environment in an often quixotic approach.  In past projects, he has tried to find spiritual experience by inserting himself into holes in the ground, by flying in the air suspended by helium balloons, and by diving into the ocean to compose music with his body.  His new endeavor, “Sick Amour”, describes his two year long love affair with a forlorn Sycamore tree in parking lot K at the Pasadena Rose Bowl.  In a 12 channel video installation and a series of photographs Tauber chronicles how he first fell in love with this tree and then embarked on a quest to improve its living conditions, to build a museum in its honor underneath its canopy, and finally to help it reproduce.  

The video installation in the gallery shows the tree and the human activities surrounding it.  It features interviews with a wide variety of tree experts, ecologists, activists, and landscape architects, including an audio diary of Tauber’s relationship with the tree.  Also on view will be adornments Tauber made for the tree, gold Sycamore leaf earrings, and tree babies. 

 “When I exhibit this piece, I will create a video installation where the video equipment will create a sculpture of the tree. 12 video monitors will tell a variety of stories about the tree.  The installation will expose the beauty of the tree and its myriads of stories so that the viewer can understand why it needs to be protected.  Visitors will be able to take a tree baby home so that the tree’s babies can have easier lives than their parent.” Joel Tauber , October 2006 

Joel Tauber received his MFA degree from Art Center College of Design.  His work has been shown at the Helen Lindhurst Fine Arts Gallery, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA and he was included in the "California Biennial" at the Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach; in "The Gravity in Art", De Appel Centre For Contemporary Art, Amsterdam, Netherlands; in “Still, Things Fall From The Sky”, University of California Riverside / California Museum of Photography, Riverside, CA; in “Happy Believers”, 7th Werkleitz Biennial, Volkspark, Halle, Germany ; in “Light and Spaced Out: 11 Artists From Los Angeles" at the Herve Loevenbruck Gallery, Paris, in “Stuff From L.A. and Other Places” at Christine Koenig Gallery, Vienna; in “To Believe Much More Than That” at the Wight Gallery, UCLA, Los Angeles, and in "Video Lounge", ArtBasel Miami Beach, Miami, FL.  This is Joel Tauber’s second solo exhibition at the gallery.