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Taryn Simon

Birds of the West Indies

February 27–April 12, 2014
Beverly Hills

Installation view, photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view, photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Installation view Photo by Fredrik Nilsen

Works Exhibited

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1964 Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1964

Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)
© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1981 Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1981

Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)
© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 2008 Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 2008

Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)
© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1974 Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1974

Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)
© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1985 Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1985

Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)
© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1999 Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Birds of the West Indies I, 1999

Archival inkjet print in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 15 11/16 × 10 7/16 inches (39.8 × 26.5 cm)
© 2013 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Azerbaijan, 2014 Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 19 ¾ × 36 ¾ inches (50.2 × 93.3 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Azerbaijan, 2014

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 19 ¾ × 36 ¾ inches (50.2 × 93.3 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Bahamas, 2014 Archival inkjet prints in boxed mats and aluminum frames, 19 ¾ × 26 ⅛ inches (50.2 × 66.4 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Bahamas, 2014

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mats and aluminum frames, 19 ¾ × 26 ⅛ inches (50.2 × 66.4 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Crab Key, 2014 Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 19 ¾ × 26 ⅛ inches (50.2 × 66.4 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Crab Key, 2014

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 19 ¾ × 26 ⅛ inches (50.2 × 66.4 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Crab Key, 2014 (detail) Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 19 ¾ × 26 ⅛ inches (50.2 × 66.4 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Crab Key, 2014 (detail)

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 19 ¾ × 26 ⅛ inches (50.2 × 66.4 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Italy, 2014 Diptych: Archival inkjet prints in 2 boxed mats and aluminum frames, Each: 39 ⅞ × 94 ⅞ inches (101.3 × 241 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Italy, 2014

Diptych: Archival inkjet prints in 2 boxed mats and aluminum frames, Each: 39 ⅞ × 94 ⅞ inches (101.3 × 241 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Switzerland, 2014 Archival inkjet prints in boxed mats and aluminum frames, 39 ⅞ × 79 7/16 inches (101.3 × 201.8 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Switzerland, 2014

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mats and aluminum frames, 39 ⅞ × 79 7/16 inches (101.3 × 201.8 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Switzerland, 2014 (detail) Archival inkjet prints in boxed mats and aluminum frames, 39 ⅞ × 79 7/16 inches (101.3 × 201.8 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Switzerland, 2014 (detail)

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mats and aluminum frames, 39 ⅞ × 79 7/16 inches (101.3 × 201.8 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, United Kingdom, 2014 Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 39 ⅞ × 94 ⅞ inches (101.3 × 241 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, United Kingdom, 2014

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 39 ⅞ × 94 ⅞ inches (101.3 × 241 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Victoria Harbour, Hong Kong, 2014 Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 16 ⅛ × 10 ⅞ inches (41 × 27.6 cm)© 2014 Taryn Simon

Taryn Simon, Victoria Harbour, Hong Kong, 2014

Archival inkjet prints in boxed mat and aluminum frame, 16 ⅛ × 10 ⅞ inches (41 × 27.6 cm)
© 2014 Taryn Simon

About

Gagosian Beverly Hills is pleased to present “Birds of the West Indies,” an exhibition of new work by Taryn Simon.

In 1936, American ornithologist James Bond published the definitive taxonomy Birds of the West Indies. Writer Ian Fleming, an active bird watcher, appropriated the author’s name for his own now famous novels. He found the name “flat and colorless,” perfectly suited for a character intended to be “anonymous…a blunt instrument in the hands of the government.” This co-opting of a name was the first in a series of substitutions and replacements that would become central to the development of the Bond narrative.

Conflating Bond the ornithologist with Bond the secret agent, Taryn Simon uses the title and format of the ornithologist’s taxonomy for her own two-part body of work, Birds of the West Indies (2013–14). The first element of the work is a photographic inventory of the women, innovative weaponry and luxury cars of Bond films made over the past fifty years. The resulting images comprise an index of interchangeable variables used in the production of fantasy. Testing the seductive surfaces of popular cinema, Simon continues her artistic process of revealing infrastructures of previously impervious cultural constructs. Simon also created a film that takes as its subject Nikki van der Zyl, the most prolific agent of substitution in the Bond franchise. From 1962 to 1979, van der Zyl, an unseen and uncredited performer, provided voice dubs for over a dozen major and minor characters throughout nine Bond films. Invisible until now, van der Zyl further underscores the interplay of substitution and repetition in the preservation of myth and the construction of fantasy.

In the second element of the work, Simon casts herself as the ornithologist James Bond, identifying, photographing, and classifying all the birds that appear within the 24 films comprising the James Bond film franchise. Often the birds are incidental; they function as background for the sets they happened to fly into. Simon analyzed every scene to discover these chance occurrences. The result is a taxonomy of birds not unlike the original Birds of the West Indies. In this case, the birds are categorized by locations both actual and fictional: Switzerland, Afghanistan, North Korea, as well as the mythical settings of Bond’s missions, such as the Republic of Isthmus and SPECTRE Island. Simon’s discoveries often occupy a liminal space—confined within the fictional space of the James Bond universe and yet wholly separate from it. In their new static form, the birds often resemble dust on a negative, a once common imperfection that has disappeared in the age of Photoshop. Other times, the birds are frozen in compositions reminiscent of different genres from photographic history. Some appearing as carefully conceived still lifes, while others have a snapshot quality. Many look low-res or obscured, as though photographed by surveillance drones or hidden cameras that might have been used by MI6 within the context of the films.

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