Selected Recent Works

January 25 – March 5, 2012
Dusk to 10:00 PM

Los Angeles-based artist Jennifer West belongs to a long tradition of experimental filmmakers who have worked with “direct film,” or films realized without the use of camera. Direct films are created by manipulating the celluloid strip through physical actions and processes. West treats her films by exposing them to a variety of substances such as coffee, mascara, lipstick, and habanero sauce, or by staging interactive events where people are invited to perform actions to the film strips, like snowboarding or skateboarding directly on them. The resulting footage is then transferred to digital format, and projected and often accelerated, which heightens its abstract and tactile qualities. The title of each work bears the memory of the process of making: extensive and detailed in their descriptions, the titles list all elements, substances and actions that incurred in the production of the final artwork.

January 25 – February 5
Shred the Gnar Full Moon Film Noir (35mm film print and negative shredded and stomped on by a bunch of Snowboarders and a few Skiers getting ginormous catching air during Aspen Big Air
Competition and Fallen Friends Event– marked up with blue course dye – sprayed with Diet Coke, Bud Lite & Whiskey – taken hot tubbing with Epsom salts, rubbed with Arnica, K-Y Jelly, butter and Advil – full moon shot by Peter West)
2010, 5 minutes, 9 seconds
35mm film transferred to digital video, no sound
Produced by the Aspen Art Museum in conjunction with Live Performance Aspen, Colorado, USA

February 6 – 12
Dawn Surf Jellybowl Film (16mm film negative sanded with surfboard shaping tools, sex wax melted on, squirted, dripped, splashed, sprayed and rubbed with donuts, zinc oxide, cuervo, sunscreen, hydrogen peroxide, tecate, sand, tar, scraped with a shark’s tooth, edits made by the surf and a seal while film floated in waves- surfing performed by Andy Perry, Makela Moore, Alanna Moore, Zach Moore, Johnny McCann – shot by Peter West – film negative sanded by Mariah Csepanyi, Andy Perry and Jwest)
2011, 8 minutes 15 seconds
16mm film negative transferred to high-definition video, no sound
Commissioned by the Contemporary Arts Forum, Santa Barbara, California and Thanks to Andy Perry

February 13 – 19
Rainbow Party on 70MM Film (70MM film leader kissed with lipstick & impressed with teeth marks by Jwest and her former students: Mariah Csepanyi, Maggie Romano & Roxana Eslemiah)
2008, 39 seconds
70mm film leader transferred to digital video

February 20 – 26
Smoke, Darts and Mirrors Film (35mm film leader painted with candle smoke, taped to a dart board and hit with darts dipped in habanero sauce, taped with mirrored and opalescent mylar – throwing darts performed by Mateo Tannatt, Lesley Moon, Jen Collins, Patrick Cates, Mariah Csepanyi, Blake Bailey, Karen Liebowitz and Jwest)
2010, 39 seconds
35mm film leader transferred to digital video, no sound
Generously supported and Commissioned by the Contemporary Art Museum, Houston

February 27 – March 5
I ♥ Neutrinos: You Can’t See Them but They are Everywhere (70mm Film Frames of Neutrino
Movements – shot in 15 ft Bubble Chamber at Fermilab, Experiment 564 near Chicago – dunked in liquid nitrogen, neutrino movements events with invisible ink and decoder markers and highlighters, inked up by Monica Kogler and Jwest, film roll from Janet Conrad, MIT Professor of Physics)
2011, 37 seconds
Roll of specialized film for scientific use of about 1,000 Images transferred to high-definition video on a hand-made telecine device, no sound
Made while Jennifer West was an Artist in Residence at the MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, MA in 2011; Funded, in part, by the Nimoy Visual Artist Residencies program of the Nimoy Foundation.

Photos by Austin Kennedy.