03 Mar 2018

Displays of Affection

Boston Cyberarts Gallery

Reviewed by Karen Lean

From within Green Street station one can glimpse a screen that might be showing surveillance video of the station lobby. On closer inspection, the station's familiar brick and steel have been fragmented and complicated by Youngin Sa's mirrored apparatus that is the real subject of the connected camera. The effect displaces reality for a moment, and at least for exhibit attendees coming off the MBTA, serves as a fitting gateway to "Displays of Affection."

The work is uneven, but much of it is earnest and well-planned. Yu-Ting Huang's The Other Ocean is constructed of rice and resin and lit up such that it resembles a slice of cake made of epidermis. Decayed Documentation is an audio-visual account of Nutthakit Liewpairat's attempt to use expired film stock, complete with receipts and vendor correspondence. The work arguably had the clearest echo of McLuhan's seminal equation of medium and message, underscoring how we make meaning through the layers of technology that raised us.