In a world driven by constant exposure to images and the media systems that write, store, and distribute this information, it is all too easy to become convinced that there is no part of reality, neither thought nor thing, that cannot be sensibly expressed through the machinations of technology and visual culture. As a response to this condition, Elliott Mickleburgh's work explores the tensions between givenness and hiddenness, revelation and occlusion, and immanence and transcendence. Through an interdisciplinary method of working that incorporates both visual art and writing, Mickleburgh's practice is invested in producing that which leavens the enlightened hyper-visibility of contemporary life with more mercurial ways of thinking and perceiving: aporia, faith, ascesis, ecstasy.

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XX.XX.XX — started in 2019 and ongoing to the present day — is Mickleburgh's most recent large-scale project. Executed through the eclectic materials that emerge during the production and representation of luxury commodities such as clothes, jewelry, and cosmetics, XX.XX.XX is a reflection on the biblical story of the Annunciation. In making advertisements and the products they describe, documents and objects such as mood boards, screen tests, and the very sets used for photography and videography all come to indicate a condition of labor and ingenuity that takes place before and during the making of something, a state during which creativity has yet to zero in on a point on the teleological horizon. The Annunciation presents an analogous impression of the prototypical: canonized in the Gospel according to Luke, this narrative describes the pomp and ceremony around the archangel Gabriel descending from the heavens to inform Mary that she will eventually become the Mother of God on Earth. Like the earliest stages in the production of luxury goods and their fetishized images, the Annunciation is an internal communication stating that more communication has yet to come, a message declaring that there will be more messages, a promise that something extraordinary will happen... but not quite yet.​