soft automata: andrew sungtaek ingersoll + oliver hawk holden
August 18 - September 13, 2022
Opening Reception: Thursday, August 18 from 5:00 - 7:00 PM
201 Guerrero Street, San Francisco
Gallery Hours: By Appointment Only
re.riddle is pleased to present, Soft Automata, an exhibition of work by Andrew Sungtaek Ingersoll and Oliver Hawk Holden at 201 Guerrero Street in San Francisco from August 18 to September 13, 2022.
Exhibition Statement
At a historical moment in our contemporary visual culture, digital reality is increasingly overshadowing our analog reality. What’s at stake in such an occurrence? How might these experiences in the digital realm, when accumulated, alter or complicate our perception of our physical and material truth?
Artists Andrew Sungtaek Ingersoll and Oliver Hawk Holden investigate these questions in their multimedia practice and collaborative exhibition, Soft Automata. Informed by autobiographical narratives, the exhibition includes inventive interpretations and playful constructions of the centuries-old technology of automata. Their hybrid digital and mechanical creations recenter physicality, materiality and the body (that which is often unwittingly distanced, disconnected or disembodied within contemporary visual culture) back into our lived experiences through the stratagem of play and playfulness.
The exhibition’s title Soft Automata is a nod to machine’s potential fragility, pliability and soft physicality, evoking references to the human body. Automata has a long history of being imbued with animate qualities, spiritual relevance and awakening a connection to body and place. Stemming from ancient Greek mythology in which the divine smith Hephaestus crafted living statues of animals, men, and monsters, the articulation of man with machine continues to be applied in contemporary automata theory.
In Soft Automata, Ingersoll and Holden present an array of kinetic machines that situate the automata as a potential pathway for reclaiming the body; in turn, reconnecting and returning one’s sense of self and awareness of personhood. The duo work in collaboration and independently, bridging technology and sculptural installations that speak to their respective experiences and identities. Ingersoll weaves together technology, sound/music, and his Korean culture; Holden draws inspiration from local mo-ped subculture, the Mission School style and DIY art movements. Their whimsical machines elicit a desire to play and interact, captivating our sensorial presence and mental engagement with the work. They urge us to move beyond passive viewing into active, attentive curiosity, thickening the multidisciplinary nature of movement, sound, and tactility - ultimately, engendering moments of embodied attunement and intersecting forms of intercultural ‘play’.
ABOUT
Andrew Sungtaek Ingersoll is a Korean-American artist working in San Francisco, CA, born in Los Angeles and raised just outside of Camp Pendleton, the Marine Corp base north of San Diego. Through the development of conceptual frameworks related to themes of the body and its relationship to labor and mechanical process, histories of identity, geo-politics, colonization, and diaspora, Ingersoll creates sculptures, inventions, and multi-sensory installations by way of DIY robotics, self taught engineering, metal fabrication, woodworking, and painting.
Oliver Hawk Holden is a San Francisco-based artist whose work takes a satirical, yet deeply intimate look at the world and pulls mostly figurative imagery of distinct moments into semi-autobiographical figurative collage. His practice includes kinetic sculpture, video, painting and installation. His work has been featured in Juxtapoz and he has exhibited at SFMoMA, Evergold gallery, On Approval, Incline Gallery, R/SF Gallery and FaceBook AIR Mural Residency San Francisco. Alongside his art practice, Holden is a co-founder of Expert Art Service, a fine art services company that provides art installation and general art handling services to the Bay area. He holds a degree in sculpture from the San Francisco Art Institute (BFA), where he studied under John Defazio, Alicia McCarthy, Terry Powers, and Jeremy Morgan.