Assembly Instructions (An Immodern Romanticism), 2009. Twenty-seven framed photocopy collages with graphite, dimensions variable. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York,Purchased with funds contributed by the Young Collectors Council  2010.16. © 2009 Alexandre Singh. Photo: Courtesy Harris Lieberman Gallery

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Alexandre Singh's Assembly Instructions (2008– ) series consists of photocopy collages mounted on a wall and connected by dotted lines drawn by hand in graphite. These diagrammatic compositions are exemplary of Singh's practice, which is largely motivated by locating unexpected connections between disparate events, people, or places. Assembly Instructions (An Immodern Romanticism) (2009) is composed of 27 neatly framed black-and-white photocopy collages made from images sourced from websites such as Flickr and Wikipedia. The collages are installed on the wall in columns that stem from a collage placed just below them, at the center. At first glance, the diagram appears to be driven by logic, illustrating a causal relationship between the images. In fact, its pseudo-museological appearance is a whimsical investigation of the characters Meredith Grey and Carrie Bradshaw, the protagonists of the television series Grey's Anatomy and Sex and the City. The central collage consists of a 19th-century etching of a hand holding, anachronistically, a television remote control. From there, a chain of loose associations draws parallels between 19th-century Romanticism and the 21st-century TV sitcom romantic heroines. Singh makes a thought-provoking and amusing case for a comparison between the cliché-ridden characters of Grey and Bradshaw, and the Byronic antihero, who is deeply troubled yet highly charismatic. Two collages represent this collision: Grey's image is superimposed over that of Lord Byron, while Bradshaw's is superimposed over Alexander Pushkin, creating two convincing characters of indeterminate gender and time period. As amusing as this juxtaposition is, it is also a serious examination of the creative process, utilizing a hypertextual approach to illustrate a sort of mental version of the game Chutes and Ladders, replete with connective conduits from one point, or idea, to another. Ultimately, Singh's meta-technique always points to the structure of the work itself and its deliberately nonlinear trajectory.

Claire Barliant