A blend of Greco-Roman iconography and modern-day graphic design, LA-based duo Cyrcle’s latest work is a prime example of the ways images get recycled, re-contextualized and repeated in contemporary culture. Like the philosopher Guy Debord famously predicted in the 1960s, our experiences are mediated through images, and almost everything in mass culture has become an image of an image of an image. Not to get too far off track, Cyrcle’s new mural in Malmö, Sweden plays with this notion of pastiche.
The piece is irreverent and catchy. Its once-venerated Classical figures become pixelated and vague; the mishmash of characters renders each one anonymous and stripped of context. The large-scale mural, titled “Collapse Part 1,” was painted on the exterior of the modern art museum Moderna Museet Malmö for the Artscape Festival. According to the artists, it continues what they’re calling a campaign “expressing an objection to the powers that be” and will progress as a series of murals throughout Western Europe. Stay tuned!
