Tuesday, March 27, 2007

REMAKE: The Sequel



As the weather warms up and thoughts turn green because of those magical words, "Pitchers and catchers", being spouted indiscriminately, the annual task that is the concomitant art exhibit for the upcoming Asian American Showcase (usually in April) invariably falls upon my lap with a flat thud. But the well from which fresh, new ideas-once so full, clear and crisp---now runs dry, and so it is only fitting that I find myself along with my cohort Chris Naka recycling the theme for this exhibit from a class I currently teach:

Henceforth the appropriately titled REMAKE: The Sequel of which, briefly and loosely, the description is as follows:

Can a copy of something be better than the original? Is it “just as good?” Nowadays Hollywood and mass media sanctions the remake by constantly churning out sequels. A case in point is the plethora of Asian cinema, animation and/or popular culture that is literally remade by Westerners and vice versa now inculcated into our collective consciousness so that each possesses its own life or identity. But critics and pundits often stigmatize that which is copied unfairly as “unoriginal”. To misquote the Iron Chef, "Which version reigns supreme?" This exhibit will ask selected artists to or who "remake" favorite pre-existing works or classics to spark new dialogue of what is authentic or real versus fake or bogus depends on the different facets of constant reinterpretation and redefinition.