The Body: Visual AIDS Web Gallery: Pyrolysis -- September 2004

curator's statement

september 2004 selection

membership

p y r o l y s i s
c u r a t o r : v i r g i l w o n g

A paralysis of shocked and famished states
(or rather an inability to digest maybe)
glazes like salmonella infections of
genetically-modified breasts of turkey
pedaling to an ant-ridden picnic through my wandering head.

Allowing myself to talk in my uterine sleep,
I stop seeing my own body
and its fleshless immateriality.
The soft susurrus of mouths open and close,
telling me of mistakes I made
and my eventual alchemy of blood to brown.

The carpenter's supplies and nails were snitched,
leaving home, bed, and bath in perpetual disrepair.
My sisters and brothers bathe in an old writer's light
with their stringent hair flaring and their naked bodies
stung and changed by the boiling bathwater.

I want to spare my little sister
the tangles of life and dying
and the swollen relief of actual death.
A smattering of lymphocytes leaven like hot dough,
and to the broken me of beads burnt into wax skin,
a body more saquinavir than sanguinity can still fight.

b i o g r a p h y

Virgil Wong is an artist/curator, who received a National Endowment for the Arts grant in 2001, and a filmmaker whose work has premiered at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival. His installations, net art, films, paintings, drawings, and photographs have been shown in galleries and museums around the world. He has also curated five major exhibitions for the PaperVeins Museum of Art, including "Prosthetic Houses" and "Cirque de Medecine: The 2002 PaperVeins Biennial." His one-man exhibition on the human body, medicine, and technology can be seen online at www.virgilwong.com.

Since 1997, Virgil Wong has also led the Web initiatives for two prestigious medical institutions: New York-Presbyterian Hospital and Weill Medical College of Cornell University. His team has developed innovative Internet-based applications for patient care, biomedical research, and medical education, winning over 14 major healthcare and technology industry awards. The Hospital Web site can be accessed at www.nyp.org.

As a graduate faculty member at The New School University, Virgil teaches media theory and production in graphic design, photography, sound, film, and new media. As a certified fitness instructor, he teaches Nia, a combination of martial arts and modern dance intended to promote holistic health practices.