Gagosian will open a special exhibition by Urs Fischer featuring his sculpture Denominator (2020–22). The work will be installed at 433 North Camden Drive, opposite the gallery in Beverly Hills.
This collective human experiment—public relations, marketing, advertising, whatever—leads to a complete replacement of any images we have inside us.
—Urs Fischer
Denominator takes the form of a 12-foot cube that displays a sequence of fragments from international television commercials in a shifting composition that spans the history of the medium from 1950 to today. Through the use of AI algorithms, the commercials have been deconstructed into individual shots, which are then grouped by theme or color and displayed in layered patterns and choreographed
sequences. The result is a mesmeric demonstration of broadcast advertising’s capacity to penetrate human consciousness.
Along with other recent works of Fischer’s such as the digital sculpture CHAO S #501, Denominator forms part of an encyclopedic composition telling the story of humanity through the artifacts it leaves behind. Displayed on its own in Beverly Hills, the work assumes an iconic resonance, its multiple sources—from broadcast television to social media—constituting a dynamic archive of the visual models to which we now continually refer.
URS FISCHER, Denominator, July 20th–September 16th, 2023, Gagosian, 433 North Camden Drive, Beverly Hills, Los Angeles.
Opening reception: Thursday, July 20th, 6–8pm – Viewing hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 10am to 5:30pm.
About the artist
Urs Fischer was born in Zurich and lives and works in New York. Collections include the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Fondation Carmignac, Paris; Vanhaerents Art Collection, Brussels; Kunstmuseum Basel; FRAC Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, Marseille, France; Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich; and Museo d’arte della Svizzera Italiana, Lugano, Switzerland. Exhibitions include Marguerite de Ponty, New Museum, New York (2009–10); 54th Biennale di Venezia (2011); Skinny Sunrise, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna (2012); Madame Fisscher, Palazzo Grassi, Venice (2012); Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2013); YES, DESTE Foundation Project Space, Slaughterhouse, Hydra, Greece (2013); Small Axe, Garage Museum of Contemporary Art, Moscow (2013); Mon cher…, Fondation Vincent Van Gogh, Arles, France (2016); The Public & the Private, Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (2017); The Lyrical and the Prosaic, Aïshti Foundation, Beirut (2019–20); Lovers, Museo Jumex, Mexico City (2022); and PLAY, Tel Aviv Museum of Art (2022).
