Boris Mikhailov

Boris Mikhailov’s work in ‘Channel Zero’ consists of a part of the series ‘TV Mania’ (1991-2002) entitled ‘War’. ‘TV Mania’ is an installation that comprises different photographs taken directly from the TV set such as excerpts of reality shows, sex films, sports events, war reportage and current affairs and constitutes Mikhailov’s outcome of the search for photography in new media reality, challenged by its barrage and conflation of different types of imagery and the levelling homogenisation of subject matter by TV. The ‘War’ excerpts focus on fighter jets and their formal characteristics and also on the actual destruction of targets as seen from the planes’ cockpits. These war machines, used for causing destruction and death are, on the one hand, presented here as elegant, even aestheticised objects looming in a timeless, spaceless sphere. They exercise a voyeuristic fascination for the viewer and seem to detract from the reality of their purpose. On the other hand, even the photographs of targets being hit, appear not to inhabit the space of the real, but seem more like computer games, simulations such as those witnessed on TV during the Gulf and Iraqi wars.

TV-Mania, 1991- 2002, Installation views,Courtesy Galerie Barbara Weiss, Berlin,
photographer: Jens Ziehe

www.galeriebarbaraweiss.de