reviews the moment
The
During the summer months most Berlin galleries are closed, and the few shows around are boring. However a
few take a leap of faith to provide a platform for guest curators. Only then does a scene increasingly governed
MoMenT
by market logic provide niches for risk and experimentation. One such enterprise is London-based Adam
Carr’s The Moment You Realise You Are Lost.
You
Appearing at first to be an anaemic display of mostly conceptual or document-based works, where
colour is barely admitted and painting doesn’t even get a look in, Carr’s show turns out to be a quirky collection
realise
of odd stories and meandering narratives. Although Carr claims that his show holds only loosely together and
is predominantly an opportunity for discovery, it is nonetheless consistent and coherent.
You
The notions of discovery and surprise accurately describe what to expect. You might chance upon the
documentary collection of unrealised artistic proposals that is Dan Rees/Catherine Griffiths’s Home for Lost
are
Ideas (2006), or trip over a €1 coin, in fact a piece by Yann Sérandour. Pile ou Face (Heads or Tails) (2007) is the
title of this laconic, bone-dry demystification of creative processes: Sérandour resorted to luck when deciding
losT
whether or not to display a series of new works in an exhibition in France. The outcome is obvious. This piece’s
radical gesture is somewhat offset by the inclusion of another work by Sérandour. L’Espace, lui-même (The
Johann Konig, berlin Space, Itself) (2007) reproduces a detail from the front page of an old newspaper that was edited by Yves
15 July – 1 Septem ber Klein. Silkcreened and blown up to absurd proportions, this originally diminutive section – referred to by Klein
as a representation of space itself – represents nothing, of course. Yet somehow its strong material presence
is compelling.
An impenetrable blackness is all that can be seen in two photographs purportedly documenting the
activities of the mysterious and elusive artist Alfred Johansen. Untitled (1966) records an alleged performance
that is said to have taken place in a darkened space. Alas, the camera’s flash was switched off. The black surfaces
serve as a blank screen for recollection and imagination. In Konceptas (2006), Gintaras Didžiapetris’s self-
referential photographs allegedly portray an eponymous Lithuanian village which is equally hard to locate.
His images are accompanied by a series of radio interviews with the supposed village’s inhabitants. The audio
files and a smart little publication with an English transcript are displayed in the context of Thomas Chaffe’s
Presentation of Konceptas (2007), a work that actually does what it says.
To some extent, Mandla Reuter’s piece, encountered upon entering the gallery space, is indicative
of an exhibition best enjoyed when viewers suspend disbelief and surrender to the suggestive power of the
works. Time Has Ceased Space Has Vanished (2006) is a manipulated light switch controlling illumination of
the gallery. A curatorial premise based on the concept of playing fiction off against fact while flirting with the
notion of failure is hardly unexplored terrain. Yet the works themselves are new and witty contemplations of the
myths surrounding artistic creation, which, lost in the summer wilderness, are good to discover. Astrid Mania
blue Firth, Resource (2), 2007, in
collaboration with tomas Chaffe,
16 books, dimensions variable.
Courtesy Johann König, berlin
arTreview 166
NEW_October_REVIEWS.indd 20 5/9/07 10:29:02
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