(Los Angeles, May 9, 2011)—The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) presents a 24-hour screening of Christian Marclay’s The Clock (2010), recently purchased with funds provided by LACMA Trustee Steve Tisch through the 2011 Collectors Committee. It will be screened for free in LACMA’s Bing Theater from 11 am on Monday, May 16, through 11 am on Tuesday, May 17. Seating is on a first-come, first-served basis, no reservations.
 
The Clock, a 24-hour single-channel montage, is constructed from thousands of moments in cinema and television history depicting the passage of time; scenes in which all manner of clocks and reference to time appear. Marclay has excerpted each of these moments from their original contexts and edited them together to create a functioning timepiece synchronized to local time wherever it is viewed—marking the exact time in real time for the viewer for 24 consecutive hours. The Clock weaves together Marclay’s interests in collage and found visual and aural artifacts with his own roots in live performance. The sampled clips come from films of all genres, time periods, and cultures, some lasting only seconds, others minutes, and have been culled from hundreds of films, famous and obscure, into a seamless whole. The result, a melding of video and reality, unfolds with a seemingly endless cast of cameos.
 
“This initial screening will allow The Clock to be seen in the way Marclay intended, by making it available in its entirety,” said Michael Govan, LACMA’s CEO and Wallis Annenberg Director. “We are thrilled to have the opportunity to allow visitors to see this seminal work free of charge.” 
 
From Monday, May 16 at 11 am through 11 am the following morning, the museum’s Plaza Café adjacent to the Bing Theater will be open continuously throughout the screening, serving drinks and snacks. Ray’s and Stark Bar will remain open until 2am. Parking is available in the Pritzker Parking Garage, located on 6th Street just east of Fairfax Avenue. Additional parking is available in the lot at Wilshire Boulevard and Spaulding Avenue. Parking will be free from 6:30 pm to 11 am at both locations. 
 
Following its presentation in LACMA’s Bing Theater, The Clock will be screened in the Art of the Americas Building from Friday, May 20 through Sunday, July 31 during regular museum hours (general admission ticket required). Visit lacma.org for more information.  
 
Born in San Rafael, California in 1955, Christian Marclay grew up in Geneva, Switzerland. He received his BFA from Massachusetts College of Art in 1980, and currently resides in London and New York City. Working in sound, sculpture, performance, video, photography, and collage, Marclay also began mixing sounds and records creating time-based works using loops, skips, and scratches on turntables in the late 1970s. Using collage in this way has been a recurring theme within his work that draws from popular culture and music, employing the elements of sampling.