press
Time folding
Exhibition - theatre Muzeum - 20 years, 2014-2015
How to capture your space at the »world exhibition«
At the opening of the Kafka's House (one of the thirteen venues with the same name in Prague) where also a Slovenian installation was set, Sonja Lotke, PQ Artistic Director, did not deny the fact that the cobweb of national presentations encapsulates the diversity of approaches of participating countries. As a matter of fact, the world cannot be reduced to any other common denominator. In this sense, an installation of London's Victoria & Albert Museum (with the original recordings) was quite meaningful. It presented the story of the festival in Glastonbury: from its inception (1970) and original ideals to conflicts that were spurred year after year by destructive indignation of neighbourhood residents. Different conceptions of the ideal identity and the ideal of perfect arrangement of society make, of course, part of our everyday life and, therefore, a matter of many-sided, seemingly arbitrarily defined and difficult to manage triad "music-weather-politics".
At such a large event it is quite difficult to draw a precise and very tangible conclusion on current strategies and trends based just on what was seen. (Among the more prominent of our hemisphere we could expose Latvia, Russia and Serbia). One of the reasons for that is the abundance of exhibitors. In the background lurks of course also promotion, however we noticed the budget that the countries contributed for their presentations played a significant role. In the current situation a Slovenian surplus was possible due to a decisive curatorial gesture: a bold time cut presented fresh visual concepts that will help to shape the future of the performing space.
How was the Slovenian team conquered the PQ 15? In the audio-visual installation, which was curated by Barbara Novakovic Kolenc, artists Meta Grgurevič, JAŠA and Ana Savić Gecan imbued their original creations with new life by redefining them. First, the video clip captures the view of the ballet dancer in the scene environment of Tristan and Isolde, and then follow static images from the performance Storm Still based on drama by Peter Handke in the same place (as they were capture by Toni Soprano). An interlacement of details with moving images arises. Further symbolic sign of a new life of scenery in the area of art is a bottle with a love potion, which hangs on the wall: the visitor is a witness to the last moments of Tristan and Isolde, on the other hand the intenity of the relationship between Handke's characters in a turbulent historical times of the Carinthian Slovenes fluctuates constantly. In installation the costumes that had been worn by actors in the performance Storm Still, are compressed in a cube made of transparent plastic, they - folded up into a new texture - lose their original function. The beholder may even sit on the object and thus linger in a sensory packed space for a long time. It is clear that both, scenography and costumes, have a very special life of their own, outside an imminent context of their performances. ( )
