Alix Vernet At Helena Anrather Gallery

A city is an evolving proposition. Its future relies on which parts of its past we preserve in the built environment. In the video installation Drag, Vernet appropriates a tarp used to shield a construction site on Crosby Street. Emblazoned with a stark, corporate architectural rendering, it presents one idea of the future – an in-between image. A cutaway shot reveals several caryatids upholding the cornice of a neoclassical building. Back on the ground, Vernet drags the tarp – now covered with graffiti – out of the subway and onto the street through the mud and the rain. Passersby stop to gawk at the spectacle. It’s a quiet triumph: amid the city’s sterile gentrification, she’s (Alix Vernet) not afraid to get dirty.
- Will Fenstermaker, Frieze