Polycephaly in D is a densely collaged exploration of the existential drift, collective trauma, and psychological free-fall of the contemporary moment. Leaping, falling, and meeting your new self in an earthquake; we lose one head so as to grow another.
As bewildering as it is sensuous, Polycephaly in D exhibits some excellent work of popular culture archivism, highlighting a polyphonic influx of images from contemporaneity that reads the acute anxieties, both individual and collective, of the past few decades in between the lines. Cinema, TV, the Internet – iconic images, viral ones, tender images, intrusive ones: the influx takes you by storm, as if you were falling into the same abyss of existence that the film’s two fictional telepaths seem to be overwhelmed with. From The Hunger Games to anime, Michael Robinson formulates a chronicle of recent human history as defined by its visual medium, equally celebrating small joys and underlining a haunting feeling of impending doom. (Dora Leu)
Michael Robinson’s collage films explore the emotional mechanics of popular media, the nature of heartache, and the instability of the reality we inhabit. His work has shown internationally at venues including London’s National Portrait Gallery, The 2012 Whitney Biennial, MoMA, Walker Art Center, The Austrian Film Museum, Whitechapel Gallery, and MMCA Seoul, and has been regularly included in major festivals like Rotterdam, New York, London, Berlinale, Hong Kong, and Toronto. Michael resides in Los Angeles and has received support from FIDLab Marseille, Creative Capital, MacDowell, The Kazuko Trust, The Wexner Center for the Arts, Teton ArtLab, and The Headlands Center for the Arts.