Artist Silva Agostini shows at Bazament Art Space three of her works, between May 17th – June 10th 2018. – The photo extracted from the photographic series “Granularity of Content” features a whole set of cypresses trees surrounding the rubble of a one storey building. Persistence of life seems to possess the space against human oblivion – The center of this exhibition belongs to the video entitled “Forms of Presence”.
It is filmed in subterranean environment, the images come from the underworld; where grief ,metaphorically, comes from the underground, from “a great natural underground archive”. Slowly moving film plans reveal hanging skins and attached to them are the numerical definitions that recall the numbers of slaves who built the Keops Pyramid (“The Pyramid”, Ismail Kadare) as well as Nazi camp detainees or those of dictatorial regimes.
The use of numbers on the hanging skins is a sign of the devaluation of the identity and mass annihilation against the respective gender. The species most commonly annihilated in the video is the goat. In Albanian mythology, this animal possesses the magical powers of the fairies. Horns of wild goats are the protection and weakness of the fairies. In this short film the horns are “bowed” …But the eyes are accusing … some of the species (in embalming) initiate the indictment. In another perspective, this phenomenon (the embalming) seals in itself as an apology to the “victim”, as well as superiority towards it.
With a cold-blooded autopsy, the camera slides slowly into portraits in sensory sensations such as; tight jaws, feeble teeth, or eyes; plans slowly change too. What is remarkable is the look of the victim as a form of persecution to the victimiser. Throughout the filming , the video is accompanied by a prolonged reverberation sound as evidence of conscious human ranting. That consciousness that has caused the atrocity, which, even though “sheltered” underground twice: in the video and even in the space underneath the Bazament it echoes a crazy time.
“Forms of Presence” invites you to meditate with a mythological character, just as historic, certainly under the guidance of psycho-social analysis.
– The third part of the exhibition, “Musical Requisites” recalls the fairies through “Die Feen” – the third act of this opera by Richard Vagner in a performance that combines music, storytelling and technology. Music is played in front of the exhibition surroundings through the cars parked alongside the alley of Bazament Art Space and its content (opera) again, conveys the mythological world of fairies , a world that has changed only shape and markings but essentially fueling war between species.The entire exhibition is in itself a call to common memory and actionable awareness as well.
Fotot: Kortezi e Bazament Art Space
