From autism to mysticism
Paul Benavidez explores their connection at Ventura College
By Claudia Pardo McFadyen 01/28/2010
The room is dark except for the greenish glow that emanates from a projected image on the wall; a few warm, flickering lights and the luminescent “God Spot,” an interactive helmet suspended from the ceiling and veiled with a network of LED lights. A loud and ceaseless recording of rings, dings, chimes and exclamations, redolent of a carnival, set the stage for “Levitation,” a sensory installation by multidisciplinary Ventura artist Paul Benavidez.
A blend of circus funhouse, video games and video projection, “Levitation” is a stimulating experience of amusing qualities. However, the concept behind the visual glister is serious and of great personal significance to the artist: Benavidez’s young nephew Giancarlo is a high-functioning autistic.
His portrait — a painting on paper of a spectacled, cherub-faced toddler holding a toy car — bears pause by visitors as they enter the gallery. The quiet sweetness of the visage stands in sharp contrast to the busyness of the installation. Combined with the incessant audio recordings of pinball machines and video games such as Pacman, along with great, loud “ooohs” and “aaaahs” that effectively reflect the excessive stimuli of a carnival, “Levitation” is an interactive installation that encourages participation and expresses the artist’s very personal inquiry into the perceptions of the condition of autism.
Benavidez’s approach to the subject of autism is based on his research on the subject as well as related topics about the potential of the human brain. He draws the conclusion that autism is an altered state of mind; and even though it still carries a negative stigma, it has achieved a much needed — and healthier — perception in society. “Autism isn’t our general state of perception but an altered state of mind, not by choice,” offers Benavidez. “And it’s no longer considered a disorder, but a condition.”
According to the artist, the original idea of doing an installation about autism evolved organically into an issue about cognition and the mysteries of the workings of the brain. Benavidez wished to create a parallel between the inability to understand emotion — that is characteristic of autism — and the ineffability of mysticism, an altered state of mind that requires one to lose his space in time. “Art is the link to both states of mind,” says the artist. “Art provides the means for a person with autism to express his emotions.” This mysticism, too abstract to be expressed by words, is equated to the losing of one’s grounding or gravity that occurs in levitation, thus the title of the show.
To produce the idea of losing one’s space in time, Benavidez suspended a large-sized inverted “cup” sparkling with a network of LED light — suggestive of a sci-fi brain cortex — from the ceiling. People can walk up to it via a large 360-degree ramp that the artist constructed to lead the way up to what he calls the “God Spot,” and stick their heads inside the cone to achieve a mystical experience. “I wanted to create a whiteout, a feeling of disorientation where you lose your sense of time in space,” says Benavidez.
Against a wall sits a large construction, evocative of a circus marquee, displaying two pastel portraits by the artist.
The portraits stare back from behind the glass of a shadow box and are lit from all sides by twinkling orange lights, creating an eerily voyeuristic effect. “I wish to create a freak show or laboratory,” says Benavidez, providing a poignant insight into society’s scrutiny of autism to the extent of transforming people with this condition into characters in a circus freak show.
Benavidez offers his own interpretation of the psychology of altered states of mind. His sensory installation sparks the attention of the spectators through an engaging adventure into the realm of the mystical, and its relevance to the condition of autism.
“Levitation” runs through Feb. 14 at the Ventura College New Media Gallery. 4667 Telegraph Road, Ventura, 649-2273.
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