"Experiencing art should be dangerous enough, or at least have the potential of hurting you. Of severing a limb," says local writer/director Greg LeSar of his thesis exhibition Life is a Terminal Condition, happening Aug. 16.
The centerpiece of the exhibit is LeSar’s film The Self Conspiracy, a “post-apocalyptic psycho-Western” starring Jacob Andersen.
“This isn’t a film that you can just go to a theater and watch or just take the DVD home and pop it in,” LeSar says. “Every performance of it will different, will be vital, will be explosive.”
In addition to the film itself, you’ll experience a live twelve-piece rock orchestra absolutely blowing out the original score. Two primal, surreal, levels of paintings, videos, illustrations, photographs and sculpture. Installations/instillations of furniture and art directly from the soul of the film itself.
At the entrance way to the event: A beacon to the world, birthed into life from the scrap heaps of imminent death: A sculpted, golden, glowing, steel horse symbolizes the ride through life that we humans entangle ourselves in as we realize that perhaps it is all illusion.
Step through the front door. Enter whole heartedly into this world of film, of character, of contemporary fine art. You will find yourself in a simple maze. As we enter into this world through the birth canal aren’t we navigating our mazes from our very beginnings? Are you lost in the maze? What awaits you on the other side? Do you know what it is you seek? Where your daily actions lead you?
“We know,” says LeSar, “that the illusory lore of the American dream, that in this country you have the freedom to do whatever you want to do whenever you want to do it, is wrong. In life that’s wrong”.
Why, Greg?
“The search in man and the thirst in man is a thirst for knowledge. A search for understanding, for identity in context with the world around him. It’s about searching to understand the meaning to all of this.”
LeSar elaborates on the film and its message:
“This is a departure from anything I’ve ever done before,” he says. “The world that we present is about 2013, 2014. One of the new beginning, the post apocalypse world, the years after the world had been destroyed. It’s about psychosis. There’s a man stranded in a desert and he’s lost and has no direction to go. In a lot of ways that represents every human being, every person on this earth. Our hero begins to destroy himself by seeking what he knows is an illusion.”
The entire thesis show itself, premiering in Savannah is “designed to be an individual rock and roll show,” he says. “Or the circus. It’s a celebration of the sideshow, the unique one time only, invitation only celebration. It’s an event like ‘Did you see?’ or ‘Were you there last night?’ or ‘Or are you the guy who missed it?’”
The Self Conspiracy is the film. The multimedia show is “Life is a Terminal Condition,” a contemporary art extravaganza and a glimpse into the disillusionment of the psyche of humanity.
“Is it all an illusion?” LeSar asks. “Do you lie to yourself and force yourself to believe that it’s out there?”
Well... do you?
Life is a Terminal Condition
SCAD MFA Thesis Exhibition by Greg LeSar. When: Aug. 16, 8 p.m.. Where: River Club, 3 MLK Blvd. Cost: Free
