Michael Zahn at Franz Kaka

Artist: Michael Zahn

Exhibition title: Tiny Theme Park

Venue: Franz Kaka, Toronto, Canada

Date: January 8 – February 6, 2021

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Franz Kaka, Toronto

The drive was so long. Now we’re here and I’m starving!

We could have stopped on the way to eat something. Why didn’t you let me know?

Because I really want to eat at HANNIBAL LECTER’S restaurant! They serve finely prepared offal.

Human flesh?

Yes, but made in a lab … so no.

Here is the map of TINY PARK. Look, your disgusting lunch is being prepared behind SILENT HILL.

Why disgusting? Look around, that’s why we’re here! We’re not here to look at the remaining nature, or the long extinct animals. We’re here because we want to amuse ourselves in our own fictions, at least in the artifacts that are left of them. We’re here in a place where gigantic settings are on display, built to tell stories. We go from the American high school cafeteria into the seventh circle of hell in just a few steps. It’s fascinating.

By artifacts, do you mean that everything is simulated in rendering today?

Yes! That’s why you’re here. To do research for your digital work.

But everything here is somehow simulated, isn’t it?

Pfff, now you’ve said it. And about simulating we have talked often enough. That is not the topic. Except in the case of an energy failure and inexplicable extinction of all digital data … what was the name of that movie again?

You’re just too nostalgic…. Wait, it says THRIVING JUNGLE. I remember a scene where everything goes quiet in the big city and “urban gardening” becomes existential. It was a new form of dystopian story that actually came across as utopian. In the fictional narratives of the time, it was common to depict repressive megalopolization. This was somehow adopted into the real world as if there were no other idea of the future. You can see this today…. Here they’ve equipped the “backdrop” with real vines. This one is inconsistent with the rest. How the sun reflects off the glass facades and illuminates the vegetation from behind … ooh.

Magic.… Do all the visitors who are here with us see it the way we do?

Maybe those who share a similar habit. Otherwise, I assume most people want to have a day of fun with tingling in the belly.

My stomach is tingling too, and up ahead I can already see HANNIBAL LECTER’S restaurant! What’s going on with the crowd over there?

Looks like Mr. Tiny, the collector and founder of this park.

That distorted deep voice, do you understand what he’s saying?

He says “For the first time, riders could fly deep into the wilds of the Forbidden Forest, beyond Hogwarts Castle, and much more … ”

Creep!

— Peter Odinzow, 2021

Michael Zahn (b. 1982, Toronto; lives and works in Los Angeles) received his MFA from Art Center College of Design in 2013. He has most recently exhibited at Visitor Welcome Center, Treignac Projet, Commonwealth and Council, The Summer Room, Bel Ami, Shanaynay, 356 Mission, and Office Hours.