BLACK SERIES
Sexuality is also a metaphor for production and consumption, which seems to be the intent of Black Series (2003-2004). I remember the words of David Meltzer, who wrote that pornography is the most accurate image of contemporary North America. This observation could equally apply to global neoliberal consumerism. Pornography is the most sought-after material in video stores and on the Internet. This demand says something about us and the society we are developing as a home. It is not my intention to delve into the pros and cons of pornography, but it seems to respond to a number of human needs and benefits, both social and economic. Our everyday visual world is saturated with pornography, ensuring that every last breath of libido is satisfied. The images from Mondongo, taken from the Internet, appear as select frames made with cookies, representing yet another form of soft consumerism, of sweet splashing, of fast food for immediate relief. I understand the point, but it still seems to me a facile and one-dimensional cliché in terms of reading the work. As an image, it delivers meaning too quickly, and in a visually sophisticated society like ours, such a surrender of meaning seems a suicidal strategy. However, like in a pornographic film, the idea is for the works to be read as a series, with a rapid rhythm, almost staccato. Mondongo's intention is not to speak of pornography but of Argentine society, of Menemism, of the scars and consequences left by certain policies, of the indecencies committed – and known to all – ranging from the disappeared during the military dictatorship to the elimination of the savings of a large part of the middle class in recent years: an enormous legacy of pornography. The question is: can these themes be addressed through a system of images that has lost most of its power and has become just another splinter in the slaughterhouse?
—Kevin Power, 2010