Moving pictures transfix the eye

The possibility of movement in art was one of the legacies of the 20th century, and just how expressive it can be is shown in three fine exhibitions this week.

At the Jensen Gallery in Upper Queen St there is a chance, until August 12, to see three works by the American artist Tony Oursler that, in their different ways, make use of movement. Oursler is a big name in the art world with work in galleries as prominent as the Tate Modern in London and the Pompidou Centre in Paris.

This is his second exhibition at the Jensen and, as previously, involves projection of moving images on to fibreglass shapes.

A piece called Blue dominates the show. This is a compelling monster based on the human face and imbued with extraordinary life.

The fibreglass form has two prominent bulges filled with eyes that constantly look in many directions. The right eye is bloodshot. The eyes are independent and only occasionally co-ordinated. They can be heavy with thought or direct or sly.

There is no nose. The mouth speaks continually and from time to time a vivid red tongue licks the lips. The lips and most of the face are blue.

What this creation is saying is difficult to determine but some pathetic words can be caught: "Help ... kiss-kiss ... kiss all better," and "Bittersweet heart", all linked to fleeting expressions on the face.

What lifts this work to a realm beyond a fairground show is the complexity of the emotions it evokes. The initial response is of horror at the sheer strangeness of this figure, so human and yet so artificial. Then its pathos arouses sympathy mixed with pity.

There is disgust at its colour and its awful bulging eyes and yet it compels attention. We strain to hear the words it speaks, yet they are enigmatic, like the ambiguous Delphic oracle. The mythological parallels of the creation of a being by Frankenstein or the legend of the Golem, the artificial human out of control, are all suggested.

Added to this is the intrigue of the technology that links us to this strange being. The same technology is used in the other two works which are very different in feeling, delightful rather than gripping. It is the constant sense of metaphors for the human condition that makes these pieces outstanding works of contemporary art.

At the Sue Crockford Gallery until July 22 are works that also rely on movement, although they are closer to conventional narrative. The three principal works by German artist Christian Jankowski are shown on television screens. He is important enough to represent his country at the Venice Biennale and for that festival he made a special 22-minute work called Telemistica.

Before the Biennale he consulted, by telephone, five Italian fortune-tellers who appear on talk-television.

The question was whether his work for the festival would be popular with the public and gain critical recognition.

The psychics consulted the cards and assured him it would have at least a measure of success. Film of these consultations became the work itself, a self-fulfilling prophesy.

It is fascinating. In all cases there is running advertising along the bottom of the screen and static advertising in the corners. Behind the fortune-tellers are suitably mystic backdrops.

The women are especially effective in dress and manner - they resemble the sibyls of antiquity and the whole business of consulting some modern equivalent of the Delphic oracle is evoked in a witty and ironic way.

The other two works deal in the unexpected. In 16mm Mystery Jankowski goes through the business of setting up and projecting a movie on a ragged screen on the top of a carpark in Los Angles.

The viewer never gets to see the film on the screen but in the background, unseen by the artist and through special effects, a skyscraper falls in ruin. Catastrophe happens while we are preoccupied with our own affairs.

In Hollywood Snow people connected with the administration or criticism of the business of film suffer, apparently unconcerned, astonishing effects, such as being shot or having their room fill with snow.

These works are clever and amusing. The effects are entirely visual and movement is an integral part of them. They are much less trivial than they sound and are certainly more potent than the related still photographs that make up the rest of the exhibition.

The third show is by Tatjana Stefanovic at Whitespace in Crummer Rd until July 31. It is mostly assemblages where found objects are linked with wrapped and knitted elements in a way often considered appropriate to feminist art.

The element of wit also appears in this show, as when a dribble of white thread complete with drops gives point to Fata's Milk. All these assemblages are appealing but movement makes Nomadic Wonders outstanding. A group of tall, red shepherds, crooks bound at the top, are adorned with bells. A hidden mechanism shakes them to produce a lilting sound across the meadows of the mind.