Lutz Bacher

Sweet Jesus

Sweet Jesus is a sound installation that consists of a found recording of James Earl Jones’s iconic voice reciting biblical genealogy from Matthew, Book 1. Lutz Bacher has edited the recording by slowing it down slightly and adding background sound from the same recording. In Lutz’s edit, these are all the names of the ancestors of Jesus leading up to Joseph, but she leaves Jesus out of it, then reverses chronologically. In the “Godfathers” work in 356’s office, there are 13 chairs around our table and the image on the wall (of the men at a table, mirrored) imitates the last supper, leaving a kind of blank spot where Jesus is supposed to be. Installed in the empty backlot of 356 S Mission’s industrial space against a vast, blue skyline, the environment feels both uncanny and familiar. It’s easy to imagine this could be an empty film set, with the city itself as its subject. As Jones reads, the sound of the names themselves cycle between common, vaguely familiar, and foreign to the point of sounding like a different language, forcing the listener to question the content and context, place and time continually, an exercise in questioning reality.