Edgar Honetschläger's 'Los Feliz' at MACRO Testaccio Blurs Reality and Cinema

At MACRO Testaccio in Rome, Edgar Honetschläger (b. 1967, Linz) presents 'Los Feliz,' an installation tied to his feature film of the same name. The work critiques the myth of happiness in Los Feliz, a Los Angeles neighborhood bordering Hollywood, where perpetual sunshine and manicured lawns mask a superficial existence. The installation collapses the boundary between reality and fiction, revealing the cinematic apparatus: black-and-white images of power lines on desolate routes depict a two-dimensional America, while the filmmaking process is laid bare as the scene is projected directly onto a screen, shattering illusion. Honetschläger, working as artist-director, manipulates perspective to make the audience a subject rather than object of vision, stripping away the deceptive perfection of happiness. The show runs until October 18, 2016, curated by Mario Codognato. The exhibition also connects to Rachel Howard's 'Paintings of Violence (Why I am not a mere Christian)' in MACRO Testaccio's Pavilion 9B, and features a video with three bizarre cardinals who use images as 'representations' of the world, winking at the power of the film industry. Honetschläger's work is an invective against Western symbolism and the use of love and eternal youth as antidotes to existential uncertainty. He states: 'Fame is what the girl seeks. Love is what the lady from the Far East cannot feel. Depth is what we desire. 3D is what we get. The United States of images.'