AMO Studios presents an exhibition by New York GIF Collective, GIFRIENDS, titled From Point A to Point B. Gifriends, consisting of Michael Fivis, Marisa Gertz, Peter Marquez and Alex Thebez, has been making GIFs together since 2010. The exhibition opened on December 7th, 2012 at AMO Studio space in Brooklyn, New York, running until December 9.
"From Point A to Point B" features a collection of GIFs made between 2010 - 2012, all relating to and created in the act of travel. Shot across Asia and the United States, the GIFs tie together instances separated only by space and connected through the artists' point of view.
The animated GIF is an Internet specific format. Finding itself somewhere in between stills and motion, the looping, moving images act as vignettes of a familiar urban experience. The subjects of the GIFs mirror the in-between nature of the medium by capturing the often overlooked moments that occur between point A and point B.
This is not travel photography as it is in the context of a "travel magazine" which is associated with leisure and, depending on the means, luxury. Our kind of travel is maybe more accurately described as transit - a constant, endless, frenzied, everyday motion. As travel has become easier, and more necessary, the experience of travel has become flattened and regularized. We are taking these non-places and reanimating them using the GIF format. Technology allows us to capture video quickly and cheaply and the continuing evolution of the Internet as a platform to share this imagery has created an environment in which the GIF can flourish. It allows us to view a video like we would a still image, a singular moment in time being replaced by a looping moment in time.
The GIFs in "From Point A to Point B" are unstable. They twitch, they flow, they have no end and no beginning.
Gifriends
Fear the Birds