- Patricia Margarita Hernandez
Charles Atlas in collaboration with Philippe Decoufle, Gunther Forg, Jutta Keother, Mark Leckey, Laurie Simmons, and Rosemarie Trockel
Albert Einstein describes locality as the idea that an object is directly influenced only by its immediate surroundings. Rejecting the notion that outlying objects could instantaneously affect each other, Einstein acknowledged that quantum theory necessitated “spooky action at a distance” but refused to accept that the universe could behave in such a strange and apparently random fashion.
The curatorial act necessitates assembling objects in immediate surroundings with other objects. Though not always defined by this function, curating involves the creation of dynamic connections between things. An exhibition allows for a constellation of materials, histories, and information to enter into a situation of possible instantaneous connection. In other words, the space of exhibition is a location where spooky action might occur between objects.
Spooky Action brings together a group of works that, in various conflicting ways suggest modes of instantaneous relation. They are brought together in this exhibition under the hope, as suggested by the title, that the space of curating might open up these unexpected interactions and strange proximities that the universe shouldn’t allow.
