Wolfgang Tillmans at David Zwirner, New York
David Zwirner, New York September 13 – October 20
In a three-channel video titled Rebuilding the Future, Rebuilding the Now (2018), a translucent spider weaves a mini-tapestry along lengths of rusty rebar scratching out an ethereal melody. A telescope extends. The Gherkin mid-erection. Wolfgang Tillmans sings a homemade pop soundtrack, not always in tune. Two young men in the room watching the video kissed in front of me, their silhouettes coming together inside the frame of the work. An aerial shot (Nile, 2018) of a river diverging into a sharp mess of barbed wire canyons. No green. Sea foam bubbles spread out on wet sand (Independence, 2018). No screens. Lots of portraits, of no one I recognize. Then one I do: “Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Pussy Riot.” She is smiling. Further on, a small milky brown print, cut down into an asymmetrical full bleed paper polygon; this Tuttle-ishness made sense, a unique object of formal intimacy, seductively embracing imperfection. Tillmans, the wabisabi shutterbug. Not yet titled (2017) showed a man’s naked body, on all fours, torso and head bent upwards, curvaceous and glistening, a man-seal in the sun, hiding out, highest on the wall of any work in the show. A secret hierarchy. Wish I knew. More pieces were not only untitled, but undated, unfinished, documentation incomplete, but still in the exhibition, still granted the full right to exist. Sexual Health Clinic, Kakuma Refugee Camp (2018): a humane picture with no people. Black rubber anatomical models next to birth control samples, condoms, laminated information cards. Family. Sex. Children. A piece in the hallway (Klaus, 2018) listed an email chain between Tillmans and a random solicitor, whom Tillmans gently coaxes out of his shell, revealing a goofy, sincere curiosity. The exhibition title, “How likely is it that only I am right in this matter?” appeared on two different works, a selfeffacing refrain. I entered a darker chamber, with large pictures of metallic fabric, frozen food, bared legs, a dark window, and past them all, a room with no pictures, filled with chairs and pillows. On that Saturday afternoon I counted seventeen people there, listening, paying attention. A smooth, accented male voice spoke about making a film on how cell phones work, how our minds are changing, how our consciousness is melding with this technology, how we take it for granted that ones and zeros move through giant wires under the sea (I want to make a film, 2018). I heard the voice ask: “How the fuck is that possible?” And then everyone in the room kissed.