Title: Jason Puccinelli: Dazzle Camouflage Dates: October 18 - November 23, 2003
Location: Consolidates Works, 500 Boren Ave. N., Seattle, WA
Curatorial Statement
Just about a year ago Seattle artist Jason Puccinelli came to me with an idea for a large-scale exhibition that would activate the entire ConWorks gallery. At once I knew that Dazzle Camouflage would be the perfect exhibit to pair with the FRAUD Consolidation Series scheduled for Fall 2003. Puccinelli has a strong history and continued interest in creating installations that require his audience to make the difficult transition from that of engaged viewer into the role-playing realm of active participant to face social and political issues through satirical humor and performative devices.
Puccinelli’s debut exhibition at Consolidated Works is conceptually focused on a particular distraction technique used in WWI termed “Dazzle Camouflage.” A British artist and naval officer promoted a new camouflage scheme to be painted on battleships to make it more difficult for U-boat captains to determine the ship's course, confusing enemy targeting systems. The brightly colored, complex designs were influenced by the artistic movements of the time, particularly cubism. The Americans called the new patterning strategy "Razzle Dazzle” or “Dazzle Camouflage."
In Puccinelli’s exhibition the world of high fashion collides head on with some of the inevitable brutalities of contemporary life. This collision is a radical display of dazzle camouflage, which is a commonly used device in popular, trend setting advertising; distracting the public with glitz while underneath there exists the disruptive force of moral and ethical dilemmas. Fashion photographers such as David LaChapelle and Seven Klein are renowned for addressing serious social and environmental themes in their seductive high gloss photos. Puccinelli’s Dazzle Camouflage consists of five enormous environments that are reminiscent of television soundstages or history museum dioramas. Each set deals with power and our own ability to accept morally and ethically confusing situations when it comes wrapped in a slick package. The five settings present different situations in which something is killed, or someone is controlling a murderous situation – a slaughter house, a clear-cut forest, a luxurious missile launching facility, the stock exchange, and an Artic tundra complete with a baby fur seal. On opening night the sets will come alive with fashion models posing and interacting with the scenery, while photographers flash away and a doting crowd gathers to watch. The resulting juxtaposition is horrifying, but altogether too familiar in its relation to fashion spreads in current magazines. Seattle based photographer Adam L. Weintraub contributes a series of large-scale c-prints reminiscent of spreads in Vogue or GQ, and emerging local video artists were invited to produce “behind the scenes” footage.
During the run of the exhibition visitors are invited to step onto the sets and pose for their own photos, thus putting aside their aversion of such charged situations, becoming complicit in the arena of fraud. Ultimately, the artist’s intention is to incite personal responses formed upon reflection of facing - through participation in the exhibit - difficult issues that often leave us trapped in a web of cultural guilt.
Puccinelli’s debut exhibition at Consolidated Works is conceptually focused on a particular distraction technique used in WWI termed “Dazzle Camouflage.” A British artist and naval officer promoted a new camouflage scheme to be painted on battleships to make it more difficult for U-boat captains to determine the ship's course, confusing enemy targeting systems. The brightly colored, complex designs were influenced by the artistic movements of the time, particularly cubism. The Americans called the new patterning strategy "Razzle Dazzle” or “Dazzle Camouflage."
In Puccinelli’s exhibition the world of high fashion collides head on with some of the inevitable brutalities of contemporary life. This collision is a radical display of dazzle camouflage, which is a commonly used device in popular, trend setting advertising; distracting the public with glitz while underneath there exists the disruptive force of moral and ethical dilemmas. Fashion photographers such as David LaChapelle and Seven Klein are renowned for addressing serious social and environmental themes in their seductive high gloss photos. Puccinelli’s Dazzle Camouflage consists of five enormous environments that are reminiscent of television soundstages or history museum dioramas. Each set deals with power and our own ability to accept morally and ethically confusing situations when it comes wrapped in a slick package. The five settings present different situations in which something is killed, or someone is controlling a murderous situation – a slaughter house, a clear-cut forest, a luxurious missile launching facility, the stock exchange, and an Artic tundra complete with a baby fur seal. On opening night the sets will come alive with fashion models posing and interacting with the scenery, while photographers flash away and a doting crowd gathers to watch. The resulting juxtaposition is horrifying, but altogether too familiar in its relation to fashion spreads in current magazines. Seattle based photographer Adam L. Weintraub contributes a series of large-scale c-prints reminiscent of spreads in Vogue or GQ, and emerging local video artists were invited to produce “behind the scenes” footage.
During the run of the exhibition visitors are invited to step onto the sets and pose for their own photos, thus putting aside their aversion of such charged situations, becoming complicit in the arena of fraud. Ultimately, the artist’s intention is to incite personal responses formed upon reflection of facing - through participation in the exhibit - difficult issues that often leave us trapped in a web of cultural guilt.
