JON RAFMAN
Ɛցɾҽցօɾҽʂ and Grimoires
15. September 2022 – 31. December 2022
Jon Rafman (b. 1981 in Montreal) takes over the Schinkel Pavillon’s Klause with Ɛցɾҽցօɾҽʂ and Grimoires presenting four visual works from 2021 and 2022. The exhibition title derives from the language of Magick by Aleister Crowley, where a Grimoire is a spell-book, and Egregore is an Occult concept representing a non-physical entity arriving from the collective unconscious that has taken on a life of its own.
The film Minor Daemon: Vol. I (2022) tells the story of the intersecting lives and fortunes of two young men — Billy and Minor Daemon — set in a surreal virtual dystopia, a distorted carnival mirror of our world. Billy (a pampered prep school boy) and Minor Daemon (abandoned at birth and raised in a child labor camp) share an extraordinary gift for virtual reality gaming. We follow their Dantean journey through incarceration where their shared talent could secure their freedom.
Jon Rafman is a Canadian, Montreal, and Los Angeles-based artist and filmmaker. He is known for his multi-media practice encompassing video, animation, photography, sculpture, and installation. Rafman explores subjects of fantasy, world-building, online subcultures, and virtual worlds. Taking inspiration from the web’s darker fringes, he explores the influence of the internet and its effects on our human psyche in the dual sense of community and alienation it exacerbates.