Whip What Stat

Whip What Stat (video still), 2009
performance for video
dvd, 9:01 minutes looped

A performance for video that took place on a temporary stage in the woods. The two performers began by tying their hair together, then pulled apart until separated. The remainder of the performance consisted of the pair taking turns whipping each other with their hair.

Social Sculpture

Social Sculpture, 2009
secondhand clothing purchased in Bridgeport, thread, rope

Constructed out of secondhand clothing sewn together into a piece of provisional architecture for visitors to inhabit throughout the evening. This conglomeration of clothing linked participants’ bodies and forged intimacy. The asymmetrical web of everyday attire wove its way through the architecture of the backyard. While the sculpture had a domestic logic visible even without inhabitants, the work was completed through embodiment and the social interactions that resulted from these material parameters.

Things That Have Once Been in Contact

Things That Have Once Been in Contact, 2009
performance documentation

Using a 45’ expanse of fabric that extends between CamLab's bodies, this live performance made the gallery’s presence in its surrounding neighborhood visible. While inhabiting the ephemeral architecture, CamLab’s “duologue” functioned as a meta-narrative that theorized the performance as it unfolded. Consisting of texts both found and composed, topics included architectural theory, feminism in popular culture, and walking under umbrellas in the rain. The hermetic back-and-forth across the length of flapping (in the wind) fabric continually took its cues from the physical realities of the situation.

Selfy with the Whites of Our Eyes Black with Eyeliner (Bridgeport)

Selfy with the Whites of Our Eyes Black with Eyeliner (Bridgeport), 2009
digital photograph

Either/And

Either/And, 2009

11” x 17” take-home flier
Either/And Example Wall (Try Hard! Get Wet!), 2009
10’ x 10’ installation

A double-sided 11” x 17” xeroxed flyer that uses two previously completed CamLab drawings. One side is a copy of Houndstooth Cameltoe (2005); the other, Futurescher Butterknuckle (2009). Both images use patterned fabric to articulate genitalia. Although each image originated as a drawing, we present them as an easily reproducible graphic for visitors to take home or distribute at their discretion. In the gallery we assembled a demonstration wall as an example of how the fliers might look en masse, in different combinations, or customized for specific environments.

Butterescher Pencil-Pusher

Butterescher Pencil-Pusher, 2009
dvd, 5:00 minutes looped

A looped video work that presents male genitalia clad in futuristic patterned fabric. The rise and fall of the penis in this work gives the viewer an opportunity to both meditate and scrutinize. The banal special effects and ubiquitous reference to Euclidian space produce a crude depiction of an event not typically represented in popular media. The video’s singular focus on this readymade narrative intends to produce a complex illusionary experience that implicates the viewer in a bodily way.

Check Out Spoonerism

Check Out Spoonerism, 2009

circulating suit (hand-drawn fabric, thread and boning)

CamLab used hand-drawn fabric to create a suit that is available for gallery visitors to take out of the gallery for up to three days at a time in order to perform with it. When not in use, the suit hangs on the wall at ThreeWalls, acting as a kind of 3-d drawing. Each participant agrees to document their performance with a photo, which will then be added to the collection of images posted near the costume.

Clongloberation

Clongloberation, 2009

circulating suit (secondhand clothing, thread, spraypaint)
Performances by (from top to bottom):
Deirdre McConnell and John Passmore, Untitled; Leopold Lincoln and Cunt, Hazardous Materials; Alice Cunt and Roller Monkey, Conjunctiondysfunction (photo Hector Torres); Theda Techopichetwongsa and Hector Torres, diaspOrganism (photo Elizabeth Mireles)

Temporarily separated--living in Brisbane and Los Angeles--each half of CamLab created one half of the suit, which was then sutured together in LA and handed off to the project’s first performer, Brian Getnick. He was invited to engage with the suit, which requires two bodies to fill it. He documented his performance with a photograph, then chose the next participant to receive the suit. The architectural garment is passed from participant to participant, each one extending his or her inclusion in the project to another person of their choosing. The suit continues to circulate.

From Brain to Labia and Back Again

From Brain to Labia and Back Again, 2008
performance documentation

After being apart for over a year, CamLab edited the emails they sent back and forth to each other during that period into a non-linear, seemingly multi-voiced text. As one member of CamLab read an excerpt, she was hugged tightly by the other, after which the hugger became the reader. The back-and-forth duologue continued for the duration of the 20-minute reading.

Studies for Durational Performances

Studies for durational performances, 2009
(Beach, Ox-Bow)
(Lookout at Straight Vert)
(Coyote Mountain)
digital photos

Using graphically patterned expanses of fabric 60’ long, we map the space between our bodies and various landscapes.

Swoon Soon Suit

Swoon Soon Suit, 2008 and ongoing
performance documentation

This three-chambered suit is designed to be occupied by CamLab and one or two other people at a time. Viewers are invited to zip themselves into the middle section in order to participate in a "non-verbal exchange". The internal walls are quilted with tactile fabrics that incorporate slits and tubes to facilitate the exchanges between chambers. Swoon Soon Suit premiered at a performance night at Los Angeles' oldest drag bar, the Silver Platter. Subsequently CamLab staged a more durational performance with the suit in Mandarin Plaza, Chinatown, Los Angeles.

No News is News No Better

No News is News No Better, 2008

performance documentation

Performed between LA and Brisbane on November 4, 2008, Jemima phoned Anna from Australia, where it was November 5, and read a newspaper article on the subject of the US presidential election in its entirety. Anna relayed the article to the LA audience line-by-line as Jade Thacker transcribed the transmission onto multiple large sheets of paper. During the duration of the 40-minute performance, John McCain conceded the election.

Our Mark, Their Mark

Our Mark, Their Mark, 2007
performance documentation

A site-specific work for a gallery space that exists on the bodies of another LA-based collaborative duo, John Barlog and John Burtle, each of whom has a rectangle frame tattooed on his forearm.

Pillow Talk Foreplay with Blue Skies and Scissors

Pillow Talk Foreplay with Blue Skies and Scissors, 2007
performance documentation

A 6-hour performance on a bed placed by CamLab in the dining room of 29025 Eveningside Drive, Val Verde, CA. CamLab modified various participants' clothing using swatches of fabric cut from the bed's duvet cover. The physical proximity achieved during the process of sitting on the bed with participants and hand-sewing their clothing allowed for intimate conversations and non-verbal exchanges.

Apex Cryptophores: Critical Field Craft

Apex Cryptophores: Critical Field Craft (production stills and video still), 2007
dvd, 4:30 minutes looped
Apex Cryptophores: Critical Field Craft (installation shot), 2007

The video consists of footage of two identical creatures moving through various idyllic landscapes interspersed with talking-head broadcasts from frustrated hunters. Originally it was shown on a monitor placed on the two pelts made from fabric and nets that were used as costumes for the video.

Too Check Effect

Two Check Effect Poster A, 2007
digital print, 18” x 24”
Two Check Effect, 2007
installation shots of show at 40000 in Chicago, IL

This show of individual works by the members of CamLab, as well as a collaborative piece, modified the two–person exhibition format in an effort to provide the viewer with a way to track and complicate the exchange between the two individual practices and their collaborative efforts. At the outset of preparing for the show the artists established a shared palette and set of patterns to be used in the production of all works. By collapsing selected aspects of their individual practices, CamLab temporarily enacted and presented the destabilization of a singular subject position.

Screen Tests

Screen Tests (production stills composite), 2006
dvd, 9:30mins looped

Two characters dressed identically take turns giving giving and receiving direction. The character who gives the direction also holds the camera.

Ghosts Which Are Not One

Ghosts Which Are Not One (production stills and video still), 2006
dvd, 9:16 minutes looped

The video is in three sections, each featuring a variation on one ghost story. Each section is filmed differently, with the characters wearing different costumes while telling the revised narrative. The different versions of the narrative have the (unseen) subtitles of Resistance, Porn, and Horror, respectively.

NeoDuo

NeoDuo (composite of video stills), 2006

dvd, 6:16 minutes looped
NeoDuo, 2006
live performance at California State University in Long Beach, CA, 15 minutes, digital photo documenting performance (#2)

The costume for NeoDuo was used for a video as well as multiple live performances. In the video, two characters clothed in a 6 metre co-joined dress unzip and rezip sections of the dress together while being filmed and filming each other.

Houndstooth Cameltoe

Houndstooth Cameltoe, 2005
ink on paper, 18” x 24”
Cameltooth Curtain, 2005
dvd, 5:30 minutes looped

This diptych of a drawing and video was originally installed with the two works on opposite walls of the gallery. The video was screened on a monitor modified with soft sculptural curtains (not shown). In the video, a pair of legs are shown moving together and apart, similar to a curtain being drawn and opened. When the legs are open they reveal a view from the ground looking up at the same legs and crotch, also in motion.