Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis
3750 Washington Boulevard, St Louis, Michagan, USA
23 January – 19 April 2009
The Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis presents Dead Shot Dan, an exhibition of works by the preeminent American artist Bruce Nauman.
Greeting viewers to Dead Shot Dan is Nauman’s 1985 neon Double Poke in the Eye II. The pair takes turns poking at each other as the neon light alternates - becoming enemies in perpetuity, caught in an endless back-and-forth of mindless aggression.
Like Keaton, they are permanently stuck in a bind. Each poke becomes a tiny victory, and viewers often find humor in these small successes. In the two-channel video Jump (1994), the artist has a succession of very short victories against gravity itself.
This exhibition draws its inspiration from Buster Keaton’s physical comedy, funny violence, and sleights of hand, traits that appear throughout Nauman’s oeuvre. The title of the exhibition refers to the 1921 silent short film The Goat, in which Keaton plays an innocent hero who is mistaken for a criminal named Dead Shot Dan.
“The 27-minutes of narrow escapes, disguises, and hide-outs are among Keaton’s most memorable performances and serve as an apt stand-in for Bruce Nauman and the way he makes us laugh,” notes the Contemporary’s Chief Curator Anthony Huberman.
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