In case you missed it, I posted about Brian Janusiak and Elizabeth Beer's (of Various Projects and LES store Project No. 8) latest project ---- Berlin gallery ARRATIA, BEER that had its inaugural show a few months back.

Next up: Patty Chang's latest two--channel video installation, Die Ware Liebe ("The Product of Love"), which opens Friday 05.01.09 and runs through 06.12.09. The show is co--produced by Mary Boone and on 05.21.09 it travels to New York and will be shown at Boone's midtown gallery.

Shot in Hangzhou, China and Los Angeles, Die Ware Liebe gravitates around the meeting between Walter Benjamin and the Chinese--American film actress Anna May Wong. In 1928 Benjamin interviewed Anna May Wong for the German literary magazine Die Literarische Welt.

In one of the video projections of Die Ware Liebe, three scholars translate Benjamin's article. Upon arriving to the "touch would" passage, each of them translates the phrase differently. "The translators' confusion of touching as a form of expression brings to my mind the idea of sex workers' roles as "professional touchers." – remarks Chang ---- "It also problematically frames Benjamin's Freudian slip as a subconscious desire for Wong, or more generally, the West's subconscious desire for the East. In this context, the use of "professional touchers" could be stand--ins for Wong, and the use of translators could be stand--ins for Benjamin."

In the other video projection, Chang employs the cinematic conventions and codes of a pornographic film starring Wong and Benjamin in China. "Die Wahre Liebe was a working title of Bertolt Brecht's play The Good Person of Szechuan (1943) -- notes Chang ---- An ethical question behind The Good Person of Szechuan is how a person could stay "good" in a capitalist society (or, as they prefer to say in China, "market driven society"). By requiring Chinese television actors to perform the roles of Anna May Wong and Benjamin, the video reverses the common practice of early Hollywood of having all--white casts portray Asian characters in "yellowface."

Click here to check out ARRATIA, BEER's site for more information on location, gallery hours, etc. Don't forget to read more about Patty Chang. If you're unfamiliar with her work, now's the time to get to know it. Finally, check out Mary Boone's listing of shows, although currently there is nothing on the site about this show other than the dates 05.21 -- 06.27.09.

Die Ware Liebe
Patty Chang
ARRATIA, BEER (Berlin)
05.01 - 06.12.09
Opening: 05.01.09 6-9pm