WONDERING PATHS
Jan Brož, Matyáš Chochola, Ana Manso, Ana Santos, Ji?í Thýn, Monika Zawadski
Curadoria | Curator Markéta Stará
O ponto de partida para Wondering Paths tornou-se tema e processo gradual de novos encontros, encontros no âmbito da prática artística, mas também da experiência pessoal de um trabalhador cultural que é confrontado com um novo contexto, com os seus processos e meios próprios.
Wondering Paths é um projeto expositivo coletivo que reúne artistas emergentes provenientes da República Checa, Polónia e Portugal. Embora, se possa argumentar que o trabalho dos artistas selecionados desvela uma série de preocupações comuns, como as referências ao modernismo do séc. XX e o seu legado, um interesse pelo primitivismo, a ritualística ou o espiritual, a exposição não deve ser entendida como uma manifestação literal destas tendências, nem como tendo o objetivo redutor de introduzir a prática artística contemporânea em categorias pré-estabelecidas e globalizadas.
O objetivo da exposição é criar um ambiente teatral, um palco onde as formas e referências, que a prática artística globalizada contém funcione como pano de fundo para a elaboração de um argumento. Uma narrativa livre, construída com base em perceções, descontextualizações, descobertas, perdas, ganhos e, frequentemente, encontros (bem humorados) com o outro, que agora se redefine, e que pode, mas não tem necessariamente que abrir os esperados diálogos, pontos de vista e de encontro.
EN
The stage was quite, the lights were low. The objects, artifacts of a “past future” were carefully arranged in the space. They bared a resemblance of a seemingly familiar past, yet their relationships appeared somehow absurd and ambiguous. A sudden yet, subtle movement of a curtain – the partition between the inside and the outside, between the now and the than, interrupted the heavy silence.
An anonymous figure slowly entered the stage. Its footsteps were soft, its movements inconspicuous. With its look wondering around, the figure stopped at every object, carefully examining its nature and its key characteristics. Its look was deep and curious, yet knowledgeable. They were all objects of a not so distant history; the history somehow connected to the modern man, the man of eternal progress, the man that the figure had many times heard off.
The objects however, were not the same, neither were they copies or postmodern remixes. They were new forms, based up on the appropriation, and layering of numerous aesthetic categories and references, characteristic of a recent history. Although pointing to different cultural sources, they all seamed to share a similar engagement with the subject of temporality, layers of accumulated time, a possible infinity, and a sense of an ongoing (post-apocalyptic) past. After all, the break between what was, and what will (or can) be, frequently falls back on the human need to return, but can also result from the fear of confronting, or even becoming the “future other”.
The figure with its eyes wide open stood in anticipation in front of the curtain. The silent observer, shall we say (?). The space behind the curtain where the timeline supposedly continued (or proceeded?) seamed peaceful. The question however remains; on which side of the curtain did our character stand, the side of appearance or the side of disappearance?
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The Wondering Paths exhibition brings together young artist from the Czech Republic, Poland and Portugal.
Rather than aiming to manifest a particular tendency, that would trap all artists within one aesthetic category, the exhibition builds upon the symbolic language of their work, and references to the modern period and its sources, while developing a narrative of its own.
Individual works should thus be perceived as representative characters, or symbolic elements of a theatrical staging, that by the use of subtle humor, touches up on the present condition of man, our changing perception up on issues of temporality, and our ambiguous position towards what the “concept of a future” might be.
