Barney's Rubble

Matt Barney's Occidental Guest at Barbara Gladstone. Entrance had space pod like tracks leading up to soft lard/wax that had been stepped through to get to office desk (pic 1). Big gallery held large walled container of fluid opened or ruptured by collapse of one of the walls(pic 2). Back Gallery contained ruins of Naval ship scaffolding and tubing with Naval Rope(pic 4). All installations conncected by plasticized steel chords running through galleries (pic 3). References are abundant, as with all of Barney's work. Melville's sexualizedchapter 94 of Moby Dick came to mind in experiencing the installation and later, viewing the trailer.
Here is an excerpt that is tailor made for the baroque decadence of Barney's film work.- "Plum-pudding is the term bestowed upon certain fragmentary parts of the whale's flesh, here and there adhering to the blanket of blubber, and often participating to a considerable degree in its unctuousness. It is a most refreshing, convivial, beautiful object to behold. As its name imports, it is of an exceedingly rich, mottled tint, with a bestreaked snowy and golden ground, dotted with spots of the deepest crimson and purple. It is plums of rubies, in pictures of citron. Spite of reason, it is hard to keep yourself from eating it. I confess, that once I stole behind the foremast to try it. It tasted something as I should conceive a royal cutlet from the thigh of Louis le Gros might have tasted, supposing him to have been killed the first day after the venison season, and that particular venison season contemporary with an unusually fine vintage of the vineyards of Champagne."
Barney's new film Drawing Restraint played at IFC. A trailer is viewable here.