Emilie Gervais

The Mercury Theatre final week, May 30 – Jun 5

30 May 2016

Instagram reality game show The Mercury Theatre is coming to a close in its final week commencing May 30 and ending on June 5.

The game —co-ordinated by Paris-based artist Elsa Philippe —has run since its launch on February 1 with contestants being eliminated every week according to the amount of likes each anonymous player receives for their posts on the mobile social networking site.

While the names of the participants involved were given before the game began, such as Emilie Gervais and Porpentine, the players played with anonymous Instagram accounts. Now on its final stretch, just two artists remain: @exoticos_paris and @erobotism.

The two finalists will be assigned a challenge by Marianne Derrien —one on Monday and one on Wednesday. There is an additional jury, composing some of the curators who already contributed, that will determine the winner, on top of the number of vote-via-likes from the public, with polls open until midnight Sunday June 5 @the_mercury_theatre.

See The Mercury Theatre’s facebook page for a moment-by-moment archive of the ins-and-outs of the challenges set, as well as each player, the strange elimination notifications, the shaming for posting late, and mini-announcements of ‘like’-awarding as the game has continued to unfold with a number of dedicated followers over the past few months.

Keep a close eye on The_Mercury_Theatre Instagram, where the action will take place this week.**

#challenge2 set by Lasse Høgenhof and Jonatan Spejlborg Jensen. Courtesy the artists and The Mercury Theatre.
#challenge2 set by Lasse Høgenhof and Jonatan Spejlborg Jensen. Courtesy the artists and The Mercury Theatre.

 

 

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The Mercury Theatre reality show, Feb 1 – 31

1 February 2016

The Mercury Theatre launched on February 1 with 30 artists adopting an anonymous group instagram account: The_Mercury_Theatre.

Images are uploaded until February 7 after which the 10 artists who receive the most likes across the Instagram board will each be invited to create an anonymous identity, and a new Instagram account. They will then continue to play for likes until June 16 according to rules and mini competitions and only known to Mercury.

Participating artists include the likes of Emilie Gervais, Molly Soda, Porpentine and Arvida Byström. 

Artist Elsa Philippe, organiser and producer of the show has also brought the images from the initial part of the project off-line into Paris’ Galerie Christophe Gaillard for a show that runs until February 6.

See the Mercury Theatre Instagram for details. **

Skin drawings, after game by Porpentine, image uploaded to tumblr. Courtesy Porpentine. 2016.
Skin drawings, after game by Porpentine, image uploaded to tumblr. Courtesy Porpentine. 2016.

 

 

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Out of Office @ Arcadecardiff, Apr 22 – 30

23 April 2014

The Out of Office is on at Cardiff’s Arcadecardiff, running April 22 to 30.

Led by Matthew Britton and featuring Emilie Gervais, Constant Dullaart, Kim Asendorf, Jonas Lund, Shia LaBeouf and more the exhibition is a “micro curatorial platform” using an email auto-reply to  distribute art.

Aiming to “suggest an even more intimate way of distributing and viewing online works”, the focus is on engaging “primarily in the comfort of your own mailbox”, so no need to be on location because the work can also be viewed via rollover links and the mailto: function online at the Out of Office website.

Here your inbox will be greeted by a ‘readme Spam Poem’ or Shia Labeouf’s glitched-out portrait of his back above muscle-bound Google advertising.

See the Arcadecardiff website for details. **

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‘Crazy, Sexy, Cool’ online @ .dpi now

16 December 2013

Curated by Jennifer Chan and expressing her concerns with gendered online environments as an artist -as well as a part of a ‘Gendered Cultures on the Internet’ issuethe Crazy, Sexy, Cool gif exhibition over at French-Canadian feminist art and culture journal dpi. is up now.

Featuring contributions by the likes of Lorna Mills, Emilie Gervais and Jaakko Pallasvuo, each artist is assigned a folder and a cute girl anime avatar to file their contributions. Those include the obvious in Faith Holland‘s ‘boobs.gif’ and an illustration of gender stereotypes in Anthony Antonellis‘ ‘alphachannels.gif’.

In reference to the 1994 TLC album CrazySexyCool, that many an internet artist like Chan would have grown up with, it’s a reminder that, online or offline, nothing much has changed.

See the .dpi website for more. **

Header image: LaTurbo Avedon, ‘dancer.gif’.

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‘Networked Performativity’ panel @ Sight + Sound 2013

Networked Performativity.
30 April 2013

Some of the most amusing, interesting and informative Twitter feeds are run by artists. Jennifer Chan‘s is one of them, as well as Emilie Gervais and post-ironic  pop star and friend to Ryan Trecartin, Lauren Devine. Luckily for Montréal, two of those three will be joining the panel at the city’s Sight + Sound 2013, running May 8 to 29, to discuss ‘Networked Performativity: Systems, Platforms and Identity’.

Jennifer Chan.
Jennifer Chan.

The festival’s 5th edition focusses on “black markets in a global sense”, with this particular group exploring social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr and their roles as artists within them. Joining Chan and Gervais will be Vincent Chevalier and Heather Dewey-Hagborg with moderation from Michelle Lancombe. In redefining performance through media, it should be an interesting listen. **

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