Drawing on a range of cultural references to reflect on universal issues, James Clar is a 21st century global citizen, and his digitally derived art smartly reflects it. After a stint in the United Arab Emirates, briefly working as a lighting architect before reverting to an artistic career, Clar moved back to New York in 2012, where he has continued to push his screen-based art toward more structural forms and architectural installations. 

Clar’s second solo show at New York’s Jane Lombard Gallery advances his ongoing exploration of the conceptual and narrative potential of light and digital technology by referencing one of the oldest Eastern philosophical texts, the Bardol Thodol—or as it’s known in the West, the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Mining the notion of a dreamlike state between death and the next rebirth, Clar draws parallels between mythology, film, digital technology and the Internet in a set of thematically related installations, videos, sculptures and photographs. 

The centerpiece of the exhibition is the multi-channel video installation Tibetan Book of the Dead (Chapters 1, 2, 3) (all works 2018). Simulating a forest environment with actual plants, rocks and water arranged within an architectural, frame-like, metal structure, the imaginative installation presents three screens playing video interviews with professional gamers, who detail the endless hours they spend in virtual reality. Shot in a luxury hotel room in Tokyo, the videos feature two young male subjects and a 30-something married couple sharing stories of their eSport lifestyles, which include forgoing fun and food in the pursuit of higher scores. When asked about their dreams, the woman, Choco-san, recalls a recurring nightmare of being chased by zombies, saying it’s like a video game that she’s created in a state of reverie. On the outer wall of the installation is Aokigarhara / The Sea of Trees, a video of a phantom figure wandering through the notorious titular forest in Japan, which is known as a popular site for suicides. 

Clar’s succinct documentaries are interspersed with footage of battling elks, rolling dice and a game of chess, jungle animals, and crowds rushing through Tokyo or sitting on the subway while tapping on phones. By contrast, Aokigarhara (edited frame by frame with Photoshop to erase the figure’s body and fill the silhouette with imagery of the surrounding forest) shows the apparition becoming one with a natural environment.