Michal Rovner's 'Evolution' at Pace Gallery explores abstract human forms through video installations

From May 4 to August 17, 2018, Michal Rovner presented 'Evolution' at both Pace Gallery locations in New York City. The exhibition featured video-based tableaux where simplified human shapes appear as wriggling strokes in grid formations, resembling dancing limbs, chromosomes, or inkblot tests. Works included Cipher 2 (2018), static images printed on paper that evoke barcodes or typewriter lines, alongside video-based sculptural pieces. Mechanism (2018) offered a full-room video installation with small black figures shifting suddenly, creating a visualization of static sound. Matches 2 (2018) displayed abstracted red human blobs gesticulating behind glass. Urgency (2017) showed writhing forms with red splashes across their heads like heat signatures. Gmara (2018) featured a vitrine with a projection on a stone tablet where person-smudges operate like lines of text, referencing the Gemara section of the Talmud. The exhibition's abstract forms evoke political and social themes such as borders, conflict, and human migration, connecting to Rovner's broader work including Makom (Place), 2006, which used rubble from Israeli and Palestinian neighborhoods. Lighting at both venues created dim spaces for contemplation, turning viewers into embryos. The title 'Evolution' invites multiple interpretations about human, societal, or political evolution, or lack thereof, with Rovner's rhythmically meditative works encouraging slow looking.