Artists' Television Access

installation by Jasmin Lim

August 1, 2011 - August 31, 2011

Lim creates sculptural photographs that explore the mechanics of perception and the ways the mind distorts and obscures raw visual information to conceptualize the world. Her work seeks to draw attention to this mediated experience.

With this installation, Lim has used as a sample case study the saga of JT LeRoy, homeless youth turned author, who was eventually revealed to be a persona created by writer Laura Albert. JT was an avatar with a dual purpose: to articulate the traumas she could not directly express, and to interface with the public, which she could not personally engage. Since Laura’s identity was revealed in 2006, she has been repeatedly vilified in the media.

The installation questions the fixed meanings and rigid thinking that limit our perception, comparing Laura’s artistic gesture to a variable in a complex, unresolved algorithm. It combines texts with images directly connected to Laura/JT, and positions them beside other social commentaries on the construction of identity and the nature of truth.

In conjunction with this installation is a personal appearance by Laura Albert, who will join Jasmin Lim for a discussion moderated by SF Camerawork curator, Chuck Mobley, at ATA on Wednesday, August 24 at 7 PM.