Dead End. Brilliant.

video, digital print, 2020

Dead End. Brilliant. was originally presented under the guise of an ‘Instagram takeover’ for Los Angeles gallery Outback Arthouse. The work was presented over four days as diaristic videos and posts interweaving my own life with the plot of Crocodile Dundee III: Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles.

Download: Digital Edition: Reference List

Read: Artist Essay

“Dead End. Brilliant. uses the original script as a template to insert personal narratives and create a surreal work embedded within the social media platform. The videos navigate preconceptions of Australianness in America as seen through mass culture, such as the Dundee franchise and the restaurant chain Outback Steakhouse. While these examples point to a generalised notion of ‘Australia’, they also reflect the stereotyped culture of Los Angeles. Dead End. Brilliant. conjures these associations to thread a fragmented narrative that seeks to reconcile the distance between personal identity and American popular culture. In a collision of reality and fiction, the project attempts to locate a sense of self in this maze of stereotypes. The medium of instagram is conducive to this state of reflection, as its social media broadcasting holds a performative, diaristic, and introspective quality.”
- Diego Ramirez