Inserted into a wall like a taxidermy diorama, Chulayarnnon
Siriphol’s Golden Spiral at 601 Artspace gives us a chance to meditate on what
it feels like to habitat Earth and the human desires that comes with it. The 18-minute
video is a fictious infomercial, advertising a way to achieve immortality. The
golden spiral is a magic tool that when rubbed on the face reverses aging. The video
takes us through images of outer space, dinosaurs, ancient fossils, deep sea
fish, interspersed with pictures of a woman successfully aging backwards, and
mixed with footage of people in clean lab coats hard at work pouring liquids
from one beaker into another. The tone of the video is one that generates
suspicion with its highly aestheticized seductive imagery disseminating information
in a pseudo-scientific manner. The space surrounding the video is littered with
Golden Spirals sculptures, arranged in a pattern that radiates from the bright glow
of the video. When viewing the objects on their own, they function as symbols
of habitation, empty shells that were once homes to genetically modified hermit
crabs. The installation is one that produces anxiety in its sterile science fiction,
leaving us to reflect on our relationship with time, our fight against it, and the
resulting despair.
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This review achieves a good balance between description and exposition. At the beginning, the simile of “taxidermy diorama” effectively obtains the attention of the readers. Then, the readers are able to vividly imagine the work and the writing sparks the desire to form meanings and speculations. Perhaps more assessment can be made for each of the element described, such as what is Siriphol trying to express with the use of a suspicious narration for the video. Also, make sure to proof read as there are some inaccurate words; for instance, “habitat” should be “inhabit” and “fictious” should be “fictitious”.
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