Kota Ezawa: Two Views

Kota Ezawa is one of the world’s preeminent appropriation artists. His source materials, video footage in the case of Kota Ezawa: Two Views, are pulled from films that have achieved iconic cultural status, but he alters them to generate new meanings. Ezawa’s images are created using rotoscope animation, a process whereby every image from the original footage is traced and filled in with solid colors. The result is a depiction of the world that is familiar, but hard to understand. Faces like Pierce Brosnan’s in The Crime of Artare surprisingly recognizable, but simplified so that one might second guess it is him they are seeing. The same can be said of the montaged landscapes in City of Nature. The flatness of the images makes it difficult to perceive depth and detail, but the human mind accommodates any inconsistencies and interprets them appropriately the moment after they are seen.