Chad Cordeiro
notes from the infirmary
We are proud to present Notes from the infirmary, a solo exhibition by Chad Cordeiro. Drawing from film, music, and image, Cordeiro uses fragments of contextually disparate media to create a series collages, etchings, and linocut prints which exist as a response to multiple, inter-connected narratives that are ubiquitous in media archives and collections.
Cordeiro focuses on varied processes of working with archived or collected material as a response to multiple, interconnected narratives embedded in archives or collections. The additive processes of cutting and pasting manifest collage-based works that exist as unique records of conversations between “the past” (what has passed) and “the present” (what remains), through media such as linocut, silkscreen, vinyl records, cassette tapes, mural installations and publications.
The End, 2021
Hardground, step-bite aquatint etching,
drypoint and collage
Edition of 10
50 x 48 cm
Notes from the infirmary presents an ongoing body of work by artist and printmaker Chad Cordeiro that comprises linocuts, etchings, collage works, and audio tracks. Drawing from film, music and image, Cordeiro uses samples and fragments of disparate media to create collages, etchings, linocut prints and audio works that respond to multiple, interconnected narratives and histories, often located in (media) archives and collections. His formal and conceptual approach to sound and image making is inherently linked to processes of printmaking.
The central figure in this exhibition is the animated character, Koko the Ghost, who appears in the 1933 animated short film Betty Boop in Snow White. By focusing on Koko the Ghost, Cordeiro casts his own version of Koko, traversing different tableaux of his making. Koko is not only a ghostly personification and embodiment of Cab Calloway, the American jazz singer, dancer and actor, but also a provocateur acting out iterative gestures to figures and monuments of the past. The acts of gesturing reflected in Koko’s hands and bodily movements points us to lost, forgotten and hidden narratives, including futures that are now derailed. Koko is a moving shadow of Calloway, echoing his motion through the use of rotoscoping, a technique to create realistic character movement for hand-drawn animations by tracing the action of a figure directly from film stills.
Under the Infirmary, 2021
Hardground, step-bite aquatint etching, drypoint and chine collé
Edition of 10
50 x 40 cm
For more info on these works, listen to this episode of the David Krut Podcast where Britt Lawton interviews Chad:
The central figure in this exhibition is the animated character, Koko the Ghost, who appears in the 1933 animated short film Betty Boop in Snow White. By focusing on Koko the Ghost, Cordeiro casts his own version of Koko, traversing different tableaux of his making. Koko is not only a ghostly personification and embodiment of Cab Calloway, the American jazz singer, dancer and actor, but also a provocateur acting out iterative gestures to figures and monuments of the past. The acts of gesturing reflected in Koko’s hands and bodily movements points us to lost, forgotten and hidden narratives, including futures that are now derailed. Koko is a moving shadow of Calloway, echoing his motion through the use of rotoscoping, a technique to create realistic character movement for hand-drawn animations by tracing the action of a figure directly from film stills.
Why haunting rather than history?, 2022 | 5 layer linocut | Edition of 5 | 128 x 52 cm
Another important ‘character’ in this collection of works is the song St. James Infirmary featured in Betty Boop in Snow White and performed by Calloway. St. James Infirmary, which has been covered and reinterpreted in more than 300 iterations by musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie and Billie Pierce, is a musical vector through which Cordeiro playfully investigates the lineage of the song and its underlying histories. Cordeiro superimposes these visual and audio references to create a new environment from existing fragments, tasking us as viewers and listeners to consider the pull of history as it bears and lingers on our present.
... in some future days, 2022
Hardground, step-bite aquatint etching, and
drypoint
Edition of 10
70,3 x 51 cm
WALKABOUT WITH THE ARTIST
Time to watch: 21:28
Chad Cordeiro is an artist and printmaker currently based in Johannesburg. Together with Nathaniel Sheppard and Sbongiseni Khulu, Cordeiro co-founded Danger Gevaar Ingozi (DGI) Studio in 2016. DGI Studio is a co-operative space for artistic research and collaboration, focusing on print-based media.
For more information contact:
info-jhb@davidkrut.com | davidkrutprojects.com
+ 27 (0)11 880 5648 | + 27 (0) 11 880 4242
