Zürcher Studio is very happy to announce “The First Ending: Resembling Noir, a group-show curated by Matt Bollinger at Zürcher Studio, New York. Matt Bollinger refers to the design of a film noir, a cinematic term which is less a genre than a visual style that emphasizes low-key lighting and is often associated with an urban setting. Film noir has roots in German Expressionist cinematography from the twenties and thirties (Murnau, Fritz Lang) and in the hardboiled school of crime fiction that emerged in the United States during the Great Depression (Dashiel Hammett, Raymond Chandler). Film noir also refers to documentary stylistic elements: shooting in black and white, using gloomy and mysterious lighting, shooting from forced or extreme camera angles. The question is not to debate what defines film noir, but to resume the strange, elusive, dreamlike, sometimes trashy and sometimes erotic attributes of film noir. All of these aspects of a “noir” resemblance appear in the works of Matt Bollinger, Corey Antis and Katharina Ziemke.

“Film noir is the after image of hyper-saturated melodramas. Antis, Ziemke and I each independently arrived at new sensibilities within our work; each resembled noir. They collectively functioned as a visual dialect that enabled us to engage in new and generally bleaker subjects. Noir is a sweaty darkness where bad men smile. It is an antidote, by turns morally muddled or immaculately evil, seasoned with fact and fatalism.

Noir countered the optimism of other popular film of its day through a conflation of documentary realism and the theatrics of German Expressionism. I find this same oppositional balance in the Maysles brothers' Gimme Shelter, Joan Didion's The White Album, and Neil Young's "ditch" trilogy. I view this work that Antis, Ziemke and I have been making, not as an analysis of noir, but a participation in its atmosphere. Like Young said in the wake of his commercial success with Heart of Gold, ‘This song put me in the middle of the road. Travelling there soon became a bore, so I headed for the ditch. A rougher ride, but I saw more interesting people there’ (Liner Notes, Decade, 1977). In our work, this personal take on noir is an opportunity to engage with our darker sides.” - Curator Matt Bollinger

Zürcher Studio
33 Bleecker Street
New York (NY) 10012 United States
Tel. +1 (212) 7770784
studio@galeriezurcher.com
www.galeriezurcher.com

Opening hours
Tuesday - Saturday from 12pm to 6pm
Sunday from 2pm to 6pm

 Related images

  1. Matt Bollinger, Crescent Moon, 2013, Sumi ink, gesso, and collage on muslin over panel, 24 x 32 in
  2. Corey Antis, Untitled (House), 2013, Foam core, paper, ink, acrylic, 11.5 x 6.75 x 11.25 in
  3. Matt Bollinger, Through Colorado, 2013, Sumi ink, gesso, and collage on linen over panel, 24 x 32 in
  4. Katharina Ziemke, Longchamp, 2013, wax pastel (wax crayon) and acrylic paint on paper, 39.76 x 56.7 in (101 x 144 cm)
  5. Corey Antis, Untitled (Skulls), 2013, Foam core, paper, ink, acrylic, dimensions vary
  6. Katharina Ziemke, Cannes, 2013, wax crayon and acrylic paint on paper, 39.37 x 55.12 in (100 x 140 cm)