January 2 – 14, 1984

The Unit/Pitt Gallery, 163 West Pender, is opening 1984 with One Million, an installation by the infamous Oraf. His performance, One in a Million will take place on January second at 8 p.m. The show runs until January 14, with a duration of a million seconds.

But that’s not the only million involved. We hear the expression used every day. (A million times?) Million-dollar deals, a million people, a million things to do. Now we will see what a million really looks like. 1884 has some negative connotations. There are of course literary allusions that re rapidly becoming reality. There is the state of the economy. There are Trudeau’s feeble attempts at initiating discussion on world peace. It’s scary.

Who cares?

Oraf does. This ace photographer is temporarily abandoning his chosen medium to do a silkscreened installation commenting on the state of the world, and on the state of the art world. His performance will be a dramatic enactment of the human condition. This will combine with the installation to present a graphic realization of just what it is we all have to deal with in our mundane existences.

Oraf is no slouch. He’s a big artist with a need to communicate on an intelligent and intelligible level. For example, his Berlin Room at the new Vancouver Art Gallery is quite comprehensible and aesthetically sound, but not exactly beautiful in its connotations. Reality isn’t just a bowl of cherries. Neither is art.