Anserine Apparitions
Entitled Anserine Apparitions, Jon’s exhibition in Hamburg, Germany “offer[ed] viewers the chance to devise and enjoy their own modern day pareidolia and non-religious apparitions.” Pareidolia (says Wikipedia) describes a psychological phenomenon involving a vague and random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as significant. Common examples include images of animals or faces in clouds, the man in the moon and hidden messages on records played in reverse. Anserine (says the Dictionary) is an adjective indicating stupidity or a marked lack of intellectual activity. Finally, Apparitions are things that appear, often suddenly and unusually, sometimes linked to ghosts or specters. Anserine apparitions have become a part of popular culture. In fact, anserine Internet casino Golden Palace kicked off a firestorm of pareidolia when they purchased a $28,000 grilled cheese sandwich on which there was an apparition of The Virgin Mary. In a bizarre yet intriguing PR move, Golden Palace has continued to grow their collection. Read about that here. Now that you have a bit of context for the vocabulary, back to Burgerman! Here’s how he described the show:
The psychological phenomenon of pareidolia and related apophenia is the experience of seeing patterns and connections in seemingly meaningless data or forms. Apparitions are a form of this, people often seeing religious forms in their tea-leaves or statues crying. The show will feature drawings, paintings and mini-idols, in the hope that visitors may have their own invented experiences. The audience are also invited to contribute an object to a shrine of anserine apparitions:
Jon Burgerman will help draw out the apparitions lurking in your everyday objects and exhibit them as part of his exhibition. Simply drop off a household object at the gallery before the show opening to be part of the exhibition. Drop-off of the objects between August 25th and 29th. Jon will take these objects, access their paranormal worth and customize them accordingly. The objects should be no smaller than a matchbox but no bigger than a cat. Once the exhibition as been completed you can return to the gallery to receive a random object as donated by someone else.
The show opened August 30th at 8PM and ran through September 26th, 2008. Find out more info at the heliumcowboy artspace. Watch a little movie with all the art and “art objects” here.
(Originally written for and posted on ToyCyte August 5th, 2008.)
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[...] B: Speaking of Salmagundi, who among you knows what that means? Just like with last year’s Anserine Apperitions show which added both “anserine” and “pareidolia” to my vocabulary, Wikipedia [...]