A major survey of Matthew Buckingham’s smart and sophisticated conceptual art, curated by former MCA Denver Deputy Director John Grant, this survey features photography, film, slide and other objects, all of which in some way examine our cultural relationships with time and the way the past appears and is interpreted in the present. Buckingham’s works are literary, historical, scientific and contemplative. Whether we are observing the date “1720” projected in Caslon type while listening to Johann Sebastian Bach, or viewing “Peace and Anarchy,” a series of images paired with written reflections on the origins of five popular graphic symbols, through the use of language and images Buckingham transforms our perception into narratives, which are interpreted by others. But even in the interpreting we are reframing and restaging history. Each of the works examines in some way the past and how it impacts or appears in the present. In the end we realize that the more we know, the less we understand.
