Photograph of Roberto Chabet's two-part installation, Intermediate Geography.
The first part of the installation is composed of walls made out of corrugated G.I. sheets, a neon text that reads 'Velvet Painting,' a black body bag on the floor stuffed with a black velvet comforter, and two box-framed objects - a clipboard with an uncaptioned photograph of a World War II secret police archive from the book, Austerlitz by W.G. Sebald, and an oil painting of the Unabomber's cabin in a forest in Montana, USA. The second part (shown in the photo) is made with unpainted plywood walls, the title, 'Intermediate Geography,' in neon, five upturned plywood houses, revealing interiors lined with mirrors, and a box-framed oil painting showing the Unabomber's house in an unnamed storage facility where it was hidden after the Unabomber's arrest.
As early as 1995, Chabet used 'Intermediate Geographies' as a title for an unrealised group exhibition that he proposed to the Cultural Center of the Philippines. He wrote that 'Intermediate Geographies' 'explores the peripatetic nature of recent art and investigates nomadism and exile as realities of Philippine life, history, art, and culture. It investigates the physical and psychic aspects of 'place and displacement' and examines their local and global implications in contemporary art discourse.'
Intermediate Geography was first exhibited under the same title in one of Chabet's annual simultaneous exhibitions at Finale Art Gallery and West Gallery, SM Megamall, in 2005. It was reconstructed and exhibited at Osage Soho, Hong Kong, from 4 March - 9 May 2011. The exhibition is part of 'Roberto Chabet: Fifty Years,' a year-long series of exhibitions organised by King Kong Art Projects Unlimited in various venues in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Manila from 2011 - 2012.
Online
2011
Philippines
event photograph/recording
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Intermediate Geography (Exhibition View)
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