The phase of swallowing curatorial exhibition of unknown artists / installation of various dimension, Basel, 2013
It all ends with a proposal. Only gathered referring’s to what once was, possible, used, in memory and hands. On a wall, short history cancels every interpretation, under circumstances already existing, found, so later it should be forgotten. “The phase of swallowing” consists of unfinished ideas and reactions by artists who accepted to remain unknown after being invited to make a proposal for a piece which should be forgotten. Only first thoughts, misplaced in the house, which weren’t further developed in form, were included in the installation. A quote, black finger, statue falling, piece of bread, curves, broken knife, found dots connected, coins re-valued, cut fingers given new extensions, unused canvases, measures and copies. Together, they create a sort of object “Lethologica”*, an image hierarchy and models which describe personal and historical losses in memory and presence, loneliness and ideology, as an awareness of defeat and impossible change. Temporary image consisted of scattered elements creates a collage on the tip of a tongue. The resulting footage becomes a photo negative of remains. When words fail us, image becomes a sentence, a story, a lie, before it gets swallowed. Every individual lost itself in a created image, they all became one false document of unfinished idea. These are stains, the rest is dross.
* ”Lethologica” - describes the state of not being able to remember the word you want.
details
a quote from a book concerning Francis Galton “Composite portraits”.
“Galton had been investigating maps and meteorological charts to extract, by optical superposition, combined data. In the course of this work, he decided the same technique could “elicit the principal criminal types” (such as murderers and violent robbers). For each photographic shot, the camera was moved so that eyes of each particular malefactor would be aligned. If a normal exposure was eight seconds, then, for a group of eight images, each would receive a ten-second exposure. Galton asserted that the “merit of the photographic composite is its mechanical precision”. He conceded that the full composite effect was diminished by the inevitable intervention of the woodcut engraver. “
the rest is dross.