The Making of 8 Mile 2012

The Making of 8 Mile 2012 is a series of 47 collages which imagine a re-make of Detroit rapper Eminem’s film 8 Mile*. The 2002 film traces his struggle in a gritty Detroit environment focusing on his rap career. Fraser’s eccentric collages offer potential publicity images to promote a fictional re-make of 8 Mile. They explore the Detroit rap world of re-invention as a way to escape the city’s decay using images from music magazines, Italian Vogue, old books overlayed with vinyl paper, gold metallic wrap, plastic veneers and cling wrap. The Making of 8 Mile 2012 presents the 47 collages in their original state without digital transformation allowing the various paper qualities from old books, shiny magazines, vinyl veneers to form a tactile sensuality. Surface changes develop in the gluing and a 3-D rippling is left loose to create shadows. Humour and a focus on talent rather than reality make Eminem an 8 Mile hero.

In the form of video art, Fraser has re-imagined the cult movie The Pope of Greenwich Village as a series of 281 collages scanned to DVD and projected alongside the 47 mixed media works. The Making of the Pope of Greenwich Village 2012 is comprised of digitally animated collages on a video loop and projected onto a large scale screen with Jay Z’s 99 Problems blaring. Fraser’s The Making of the Pope of Greenwich Village 2012 will go on to be projected on the rough exterior of a four storey building every night for a month.

Fraser has made a number of these re-make movie collages in the last three years, previously focusing on Fellini’s La Dolce Vita in a series of 11 large light boxes. The collages were digitally enlarged as huge translucent dioramas with fictional portraits of possible re-enactments. Jacqueline Fraser thanks Eminem, all the movie makers and the endless movies and their fascinating worlds she has yet to re-invent.

 * '8 Mile' is the rim of Detroit where decay begins.

Jacqueline Fraser has exhibited widely in a career that spans more than three decades. Later this year, Fraser’s The Making of the Pope of Greenwich Village 2012 will be screened in New York City as part of the Big Screen Projections project. In 2011 Fraser was included in The Bowery Artists Tribute at the New Museum, New York. In 2010, her works were included in Feminism Never Happened at IMA in  Brisbane. In 2005/2006 she was included in Superstars – From Warhol to Madonna, Kunsthalle Vienna. In 2004 she was shortlisted for two major art prizes: Artes Mundi in Cardiff (one of 10 international artists) and the Walter’s Prize in Auckland. In 2001-2002 Fraser had a solo exhibition at the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York and in 2001 she represented New Zealand in their inaugural presentation at the Venice Biennale – the full installation of which was acquired by the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. Also in 2001, Fraser was selected for the Yokohama Triennale. Fraser’s work is held in every major public collection in New Zealand, the National Gallery of Australia as well as numerous private and corporate collections around the world. The Making of 8 Mile 2012 is Fraser’s seventh solo exhibition with Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery.