Gabriel Shalom lends objects a personality all their own. In his videos he brings inanimate products to life and imbues them with character. For the presentation of the MINI Clubman at the Frankfurt Motor Show, the artist from New York created the clip Object Oriented in his Berlin studio.
Gabriel Shalom lets you experience the car with all your senses. The MINI Clubman with its extraordinary design, its two-part split tailgate and spectacular Clubdoor (the additional half-door on the right-hand side) was the perfect challenge for Shalom. The 28-year-old artist gives his images a "groove", looping and editing to show rhythmic sequences of movement. People and objects in motion are transformed into a minor symphony of interactive rituals. "When I’m working on my films, I’m in a kind of trance-like state," he says. "And the films, in turn, have a kind of trance-like effect on the viewer." Shalom also explores how objects can suddenly acquire their own history and personality through interaction with people. He weaves together soundtrack and images in a unique fashion: when a man runs his hand over the globe, we not only see but also hear this movement. The interaction between person and object gradually develops its own rhythm and becomes a kind of song. "If we have no physical contact with an object, that object remains lifeless," says Shalom. "But when we use objects, something of our aura rubs off on them." In fleet-footed, rhythmic images, he nonchalantly reveals the importance of this aura. And it is cars – arguably the most important objects in our mobile lives – that need this aura, this individuality. A driver and a vehicle exist in a kind of symbiosis. It is the person who gives the car its individuality. A car acts as a magnet for all sorts of personal possessions, right down to the stickers on its rear window. Conversely, the MINI Clubman provides its owner with mobility, independence and speed, while also functioning as a status symbol and a personality marker. Each MINI Clubman – whose "space miracle" qualities mean it can be configured in countless different ways despite its compact dimensions – becomes a travel companion with a personality all of its own. Gabriel Shalom’s video clip renders this process fascinatingly palpable.
