Michel Auder
And virtually everything said has been said incorrectly, and it's been said wrong,
or it's been covered wrong by the press,

June 15 - August 10, 2018

*Please note: this exhibition contains graphic images which may be unsuitable for children

SELECTED PRESS: 
ARTnews
Hyperallergic
Frieze

PRESS RELEASE: 

Martos Gallery is pleased to present Michel Auder’s second solo show with the gallery, And virtually everything said has been said incorrectly, and it's been said wrong, or it's been covered wrong by the press, on view June 15 – August 3, 2018, which features his new film TRUMPED (2018), a mural of new photographs.

A large mounted photo, standing seven feet tall, greets you before you enter the main gallery. The mural spans the longest wall in the gallery and is composed of dozens of photos arranged and pinned by the artist. It reads like a text; his own language of violence, emotions, politics, transference, and subjectivity. Freestanding walls made by artist Servane Mary divide the gallery and create an intimate space for guests to read it.

TRUMPED (2018) is projected on the opposing wall in the gallery. Similar to the immediacy of his photo-making, the footage is captured entirely from Auder’s cell phone and goes through moments of stop-motion, surveillance, and flashbacks. The film’s original score by Matthias Grübel is heard throughout the gallery.

As an author, Auder’s visual narratives carry a diaristic tone – rid of didacticism. Though these “texts” in the gallery, both pinned and projected, are not composed of traditional linguistic signs like letters and phrases, as a semiotic text it is Auder’s Umwelt; a lexicon that is based on both limited knowledge and unimagined possibilities.

Since the early 1960s, Michel Auder has been capturing everything around him. Never without some form of camera in hand, his collection of images, both still and moving, is prolific. His practice has been called “second nature,” but would more accurately be described as first nature. Through decades of ever-changing technology – film to digital, super 8 to HD – the lens has remained a constant extension of Auder’s body and an ongoing archive. Rather than complain about new technology and social media, and as a result, the saturation of images many of us experience, Auder embraces it. He embraces saturation.

Michel Auder (b. 1945 in Soissons, France) is an experimental video and photo artist who currently lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.

Select exhibitions and film screenings include: “Fictional Art Film”, Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, New York, NY (2019); “And virtually everything said has been said incorrectly, and it’s been said wrong, or it’s been covered wrong by the press”, Martos Gallery, NY (2018); Documenta 14, National Museum of Contemporary Art, Athens, Greece and Kassel, Germany (2017); “Portrait of Alice Neel”, presented by David Zwirner, The Kitchen, New York, NY (2017); “Roman Variations”, Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, Rome, Italy (2017); “Everybody Knows”, Martos Gallery, New York, NY (2015); “The Whitney Biennial”, Whitney Museum of Art, New York, NY (2014); “Michel Auder”, Foundation Vincent Van Gogh, Arles, France (2015); “Mixing up the Medicine”, Kayne Griffin Corcoran, Los Angeles, CA (2015); “Michel Auder: Made In New York, 1968-2014”, Anthology Film Archives, New York, NY (2014); “Michel Auder: Video Pieces” Marlborough Chelsea, New York, NY (2014); “Screen Life #13 & Polaroid”, Office Baroque, Brussels, Belgium (2013); “Stories, Myths, Ironies, and Other Songs: Conceived, Directed, Edited, and Produced by M. Auder”, Kunsthalle Basel, Basel, Switzerland (2013); “Endless Column and Narcolepsy”, Galleria Fonti, Naples, Italy (2011); “Keeping Busy: An Inaccurate Survey of Michel Auder”, Zach Feuer Gallery in collaboration with Newman Popiashvili Gallery, Participant Inc NY, and Volume2, New York, NY and Los Angeles, CA (2010); “Michel Auder: Chronicles and Other Scenes”, Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown, MA (2004); “Voyage to the Center of the Phone Lines”, Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery, New York, NY (1994). He was an artist-in-residence at Berliner Künstlerprogramm, German Academic Exchange Service, Berlin, Germany (2016).

Auder’s works are in the permanent collections of Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, Netherlands; FRAC Provence-Alpes-Côtes d’Azur, Marseille, France; Kadist Art Foundation, Paris, France; Brandhorst Museum, Munich, Germany; Muhka, Antwerp, Belgium and Anthology film Archives, New York, NY.