VIDEODYSSEY is an international adventure via a number of videos that have already drawn considerable attention to themselves, though they have never been seen in New York. The notable exception is Patrick Martinez’ film, The Jesuses, which was briefly shown at Parker’s Box in November, and returns now by popular demand. On the face of it, it might seem that this is not the only way in which Martinez’ piece is the exception that proves the rule, since the other films in the exhibition all embark on the exploration of a foreign context – physically, socially, symbolically etc. In Martinez’ film, the artist has selected a wide array of classical paintings of Christ on the cross, and using the fact of their close resemblance, he has made each one into a single frame of an animated film. While these images and their context may be very familiar, it’s nevertheless true that the crucifixion also took place in a far off land, and the simplicity of Martinez’ project evokes multiple journeys: physical, artistic, conceptual, historical, religious, spiritual…

Jordi Colomer’s already acclaimed film, Arabian Stars was co-produced by and for the Reina Sofia National Museum in Madrid, and the Dalí Museum in Florida, and is presented in collaboration with Galerie Michel Rein, Paris. The film was the result of a long expedition to the remote, and isolated state of Yemen. While there, Colomer produced a number of simple placards, painted on cardboard, and bearing the name in Arabic of a whole array of western stars, some real celebrities, many fictional: Picasso, Sherlock Holmes, Batman, James Bond, Homer Simpson, Barbie, Bruce Lee, Santa Claus etc. The artist invited ordinary people to carry these placards, and filmed them doing so – acutely aware that the value of these names in Yemen, was in most cases as radically different as its culture and society is to the western world we know.

Agnieszka Kalinowska presents Well that is what everybody thinks about us militaries… a quietly disturbing film depicting clean cut young sailors, speaking a hard to identify language, particularly since initially there are no subtitles. The film initially appears to be contrived and perhaps even made for education, but in the second part (with subtitles), we begin to understand that the hopes and fears of a young female sailor, brooding on her fate as time passes on an endless voyage, are as authentic as they are uncomfortable.

Simon Faithfull’s film, Escape Vehicle 6, was produced in the UK with support from the Video and Film Umbrella, and Channel 4 television. In it, an office chair is attached to a weather balloon (also equipped with a video camera) and it’s journey from a field in England to the black edge of space is recorded for posterity, and simultaneously beamed back to Earth until the signal is lost and the chair continues its journey unrecorded…

Jason Glasser’s film Lion et Oiseau, was produced for a major solo exhibition at the Chapelle St. Jacques Contemporary Art Center in France. The bird, two-legged lion and centaurs that are the films protagonists are accompanied by a whimsical soundtrack that takes the artist firmly back to his rockstar roots (recently revived with a successful solo CD, Fruitkey – Beauty Is, on Rock Revolution records). At the same time the work has all of the poetry and ominous ambiguity that he has embraced in his recent paintings, and draws a direct line from the lion in the artist’s permanent installation at PS1.