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The current inflation of art practice that combines
references to pop culture with modernist aesthetics has resulted in
a profusion of works that, through a simple (sometimes simplistic)
play of contrasts, reflect postmodern nostalgia -
often accompanied by an unfulfilled claim to
offer a critical perspective.
Gerard Byrne's works include a multitude of popular references (science fiction, luxury cars, Playboy magazine, sexual practices, Frank Sinatra and familiar French intellectuals) and adopt a polished, modernist aesthetics, but he avoids focusing on simple contradiction or offering any hint of mourning, either for a past or present reality.
Byrne makes photographs, videos and installations of pristine appearance, adopting as a starting point published texts (interviews, roundtable discussions, advertisements or theoretical essays). These are then articulated in relation to modernist aesthetics, both in the 'content' of the artworks (through the use of a specific architectural background, for example) and their 'form' (through the works' clean, stylised presentation).1 Probably the most immediate and productive way to approach Byrne's work is by drawing a comparison with Bertolt Brecht's notion of epic theatre. Two recent videos, Homme à Femmes (Michel Debrane) (2004) and *ZAN-*T185 r.1: (Interview) v.1, no. 4 - v.2, no. 6 ... no. 21 - v.3, no. 9. (2007), make the parallels between the two especially evident. Both works restage interviews with famous people (or people who aspire to be famous) that were originally printed in periodicals, and in both the setting is similar: an actor, who plays the role of the interviewee, occupies the frame, and answers questions posed by an invisible interviewer. In Homme à Femmes the screen shows a white-bearded, elderly man answering questions in French to a
