Geomancies
2017, REDCAT GALLERY, Los Angeles, CA
Multimedia installation, solo show with collaborative centerpiece
Artists: Miljohn Ruperto and Rini Yun Keagy
Curated by Ruth Estévez
Exhibited at REDCAT GALLERY, Los Angeles CA, Jan 14 - Mar 12, 2017
Geomancies consists of a film, a series of photographic and video works, as well as a new performance piece. The centerpiece of the exhibition, Ordinal (SW/NE), 2017, is an experimental documentary created with filmmaker Rini Yun Keagy. The film traces the cultural and environmental influences of a soil-dwelling, pathogenic fungus, Coccidioides immitis, and its associated disease, valley fever, in California's Central Valley. Interweaving past, present and mythological time, the film draws upon historical and cultural references, including the plight of migrants during the Depression, the spread of the disease in recent years, contemporary theories of climate change, and the significance of the desert wind in ancient Assyria. In Ruperto and Keagy’s film, natural phenomena remain neutral, fleeing from any kind of judgment and avoiding binary oppositions of positive and negative, destruction and regeneration, life and death.