From 12 September to 24 October 2009

Think.21 is pleased to present the solo exhibition of Greek-Italian artist Angelo Plessas. “Symmetry of Chaos” features work that range from interactive website projections to neon sculptures and photographic installations.
Plessas uses the Internet as the base for his work to create websites of animated drawings, which alternate between, funny and poignant, strange and poetic all at the same time. The themes of the websites deal with femininity and identity and reflect the abstract emotions often experienced in electronic communication and everyday misunderstandings. Fusing the iconography of ancient civilisations, surrealist abstractions and modernist references, the websites have often an anthropomorphic touch that are “portraits of people around me or the many sides of myself.” Plessas invites the viewer to interact with the websites in a limited yet repeated way that confers a magnetic quality to the work.
In “SymmetryOfChaos.com” two small robots are swirled by the viewer around three pyramids that form the shape of a face, while in “UnWhiteMe.com” he is given the opportunity to shoot colours on the white page of the website during which the sound of a gun loading and unloading is heard in each click of the mouse. Plessas’ websites are pieces that can be endlessly viewed, reproduced and copied and still exist as a unique work.

The neon sculptures and photographic installation form another aspect of Plessas’ work, one that is attempting to show the infinite relations between the virtual, imaginary and real world. The photographs are part of the ongoing project “International Portrait Gallery,” an online collection of images of architectural constructions, landscapes and object formations that randomly or purposefully display anthropomorphic qualities, and from which the artists often draws his inspiration for his website pieces. The neon sculptures are part of another ongoing project called “The Angelo Foundation,” that the artist is using as an “umbrella” for a number of projects ranging from Manifesto Declarations, Robot Poetry Readings and the production of its own currency via the Bank of Angelo. Under the auspices of the Angelo Foundation, Plessas performs lectures, charities, exchange of ideas using the available free Internet platforms and creates imaginary characters that assume the roles of his foundation’s board of directors. With this multiple and ever growing body of work, Plessas offers a “…whimsical and nuanced critique of the society of spectacle, appearance and commodity.” *

Plessas has exhibited extensively in Europe and abroad. His work has been included in exhibitions at Deitch Projects, White Columns and Affirmation Arts in New York, the Deste Foundation, Benaki Museum and National Museum of Contemporary Arts in Athens, Hayward Gallery in London, Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography and the SESC Paolista Museum in Sao Paolo. He is currently exhibiting at Jeu de Paume, Paris, “Heaven” - 2nd Athens Biennial and the Berkeley Art Museum in California. Plessas has been recently awarded the Fulbright scholarship in the Arts.

* Richard Rinehart, Digital Media Curator & Adjunct Curator, Berkeley Art Museum, California.