Szabolcs KissPál
26 Nov 2009 - 31 Jan 2010
SZABOLCS KISSPAL
"One by 1 "
26.11.2009 - 31.01.2010
Curator: Raluca Velisar
One by 1 is the first solo exhibition of Szabolcs KissPál in Bucharest, and presents works that survey his entire career so far. Even though we can identify a difference between the lyrical style of his first works and a more critical manner in the latest it is too difficult to organize the themes explored by the artist, because they interconnect or overlap in each period of creation: the mediation of reality through a technological perspective, the duality visible-invisible, positive-negative, the two appearances of the same thing, the relationship between power and representation, or the attitude of the individual in front of history, society and politics.
KissPál manipulates the visible world by minimal and reductionist means to construct a clear sysem of metaphors that reveal the fragility / relativism of the human perception and vision, the tension between similarity and difference, the simultaneous duality of thinking and seeing, as formulated by Wittgenstein. His works are in general perfectly arranged, formally and analytically (with the exception of the video Shards of Glass 2003, where the unpredicted configures the meaning). The videos refer to history of optics’ methods of constructing the illusion of reality or to the iconic manipulation of the nowadays’ digitized images; the installations combine simple elements in a very sophisticated way and they usually investigate the dual and paradoxical condition of reality.
The image manipulation has the role of analyzing and understanding the complexity of perception, and even its vulnerability. It can be structured by the multiple points of view (The Dance 2001) or by the perspectivic representation of spatiality (Elsewhere 1999). It can be limited to the visible part of reality that induces the vision modeled by sensations (Edging 2003) or it can be mediated by subjective interpretations that make appeal both to visual (Rever RO 2000) and subjective (Shards of Glass) memory. An edited found footage, an entirely manipulated image through editing techniques or the recording of a live event; in all these situations the resulting image would be susceptible of reflecting the relationship between power (be it ideological, official or personal) and representation.
Contemporary technologies allow the creation of perfect copies and the global politics enforce the standardization of the consumerist practices. The repetitively duplication of a series of objects in Silicon Valse installation (2001) doesn’t have the function to organize the vision but to disrupt the created image. The reproduction procedure is not applied to the objects themselves, but to the effects of a series of phenomena, which normally cannot action identically on them (indistinguishable broken windows, matching broken flower pots, identically burnt candles). Not excluding the important issue of mechanical reproduction and its consequential debates about authorship, copy versus original, real or virtual prototype, KissPál remembers us about the fact that these serial products don’t have an identity but just an existence. No matter how unique is the procedure of objects’ conception and in spite of the utopist standardization of the politics implemented on certain segments of population, the external elements (unexpected) or internal (of identity nature) act in different ways. The installation One by 1 (2005), that reproduces a device, usually used for the accurate measuring of the things that are to be produced or systematized (a meter split in centimeters) contains a destabilizing element: 1 is the only number reproduced in place of all the other subsequent. Order and absolute unity, or, on the contrary, relativisation and multiplicity; conflict or consensus, individual or collective...
The importance of the individual action on the collective history comes out in the Utopia Battery installation (2008) with the interaction between the visitor and a symbolic element: the flag. This is not a flag that denotes the national identity as the one used in Rever (RO) - where the colors symbolizing and maintaining this idea are reversed for a metaphorical reevaluation of its still evocative potential nowadays - but one that “accumulates” the history and the ideologies. Even though the engagement of the visitor with the red flag is a deconstructive one (after the movement’s detection the flag begins to unsew itself) the participation process is more valuable than a static, distant or contemplative position. Ideologies are created by individual actions and contributions and that’s why the approval and reiteration of the symbols it promotes are the responsibility of every participant to the history making.
Szabolcs KissPál (b. 1967, Tg. Mures), Lives and works in Budapest.
Selected personal exhibitions: 2007 The Dance, Turner Contemporary, Margate (GB) | 2006 From a ball to a holster, Galerie van Gelder, Amsterdam | 2001 Silicon valse, Francia Intézet, Budapest | 1999 Breathless, Artec London, etc.
Selected group exhibitions: 2009 New acquisitions.Rarely seen works, Ludwig Museum, Budapest | 2008 What’s Up?, Mucsarnok, Budapest | 2007 Say it isn’t so, Neues Museum Weserburg, Bremen | 2006 Re_Dis_Trans, Apexart, New York; Private Matter?, Mucsarnok, Budapest | 2003 Aura, Millenáris Park, Budapest; Poesis, Mûcsarnok, Budapest; Prague Biennial | 2002 Vision, Mucsarnok, Budapest; Unstable Narratives, HartwareKunstverein, Dortmund | 2001 Climate, Mucsarnok, Budapest; Context, 49. Venice Biennial Romanian Pavillon | 1993 Ex Oriente Lux, Sala Dalles, Bucuresti, etc.
With the support of: BRD Groupe Societe Generale, Hotel Novotel, Murfatlar
Media partners: Igloo, Arhitectura, 24 Fun, feeder.ro, rfi, Cocor Media Channel
Special thanks: Szent István Király Múzeum
"One by 1 "
26.11.2009 - 31.01.2010
Curator: Raluca Velisar
One by 1 is the first solo exhibition of Szabolcs KissPál in Bucharest, and presents works that survey his entire career so far. Even though we can identify a difference between the lyrical style of his first works and a more critical manner in the latest it is too difficult to organize the themes explored by the artist, because they interconnect or overlap in each period of creation: the mediation of reality through a technological perspective, the duality visible-invisible, positive-negative, the two appearances of the same thing, the relationship between power and representation, or the attitude of the individual in front of history, society and politics.
KissPál manipulates the visible world by minimal and reductionist means to construct a clear sysem of metaphors that reveal the fragility / relativism of the human perception and vision, the tension between similarity and difference, the simultaneous duality of thinking and seeing, as formulated by Wittgenstein. His works are in general perfectly arranged, formally and analytically (with the exception of the video Shards of Glass 2003, where the unpredicted configures the meaning). The videos refer to history of optics’ methods of constructing the illusion of reality or to the iconic manipulation of the nowadays’ digitized images; the installations combine simple elements in a very sophisticated way and they usually investigate the dual and paradoxical condition of reality.
The image manipulation has the role of analyzing and understanding the complexity of perception, and even its vulnerability. It can be structured by the multiple points of view (The Dance 2001) or by the perspectivic representation of spatiality (Elsewhere 1999). It can be limited to the visible part of reality that induces the vision modeled by sensations (Edging 2003) or it can be mediated by subjective interpretations that make appeal both to visual (Rever RO 2000) and subjective (Shards of Glass) memory. An edited found footage, an entirely manipulated image through editing techniques or the recording of a live event; in all these situations the resulting image would be susceptible of reflecting the relationship between power (be it ideological, official or personal) and representation.
Contemporary technologies allow the creation of perfect copies and the global politics enforce the standardization of the consumerist practices. The repetitively duplication of a series of objects in Silicon Valse installation (2001) doesn’t have the function to organize the vision but to disrupt the created image. The reproduction procedure is not applied to the objects themselves, but to the effects of a series of phenomena, which normally cannot action identically on them (indistinguishable broken windows, matching broken flower pots, identically burnt candles). Not excluding the important issue of mechanical reproduction and its consequential debates about authorship, copy versus original, real or virtual prototype, KissPál remembers us about the fact that these serial products don’t have an identity but just an existence. No matter how unique is the procedure of objects’ conception and in spite of the utopist standardization of the politics implemented on certain segments of population, the external elements (unexpected) or internal (of identity nature) act in different ways. The installation One by 1 (2005), that reproduces a device, usually used for the accurate measuring of the things that are to be produced or systematized (a meter split in centimeters) contains a destabilizing element: 1 is the only number reproduced in place of all the other subsequent. Order and absolute unity, or, on the contrary, relativisation and multiplicity; conflict or consensus, individual or collective...
The importance of the individual action on the collective history comes out in the Utopia Battery installation (2008) with the interaction between the visitor and a symbolic element: the flag. This is not a flag that denotes the national identity as the one used in Rever (RO) - where the colors symbolizing and maintaining this idea are reversed for a metaphorical reevaluation of its still evocative potential nowadays - but one that “accumulates” the history and the ideologies. Even though the engagement of the visitor with the red flag is a deconstructive one (after the movement’s detection the flag begins to unsew itself) the participation process is more valuable than a static, distant or contemplative position. Ideologies are created by individual actions and contributions and that’s why the approval and reiteration of the symbols it promotes are the responsibility of every participant to the history making.
Szabolcs KissPál (b. 1967, Tg. Mures), Lives and works in Budapest.
Selected personal exhibitions: 2007 The Dance, Turner Contemporary, Margate (GB) | 2006 From a ball to a holster, Galerie van Gelder, Amsterdam | 2001 Silicon valse, Francia Intézet, Budapest | 1999 Breathless, Artec London, etc.
Selected group exhibitions: 2009 New acquisitions.Rarely seen works, Ludwig Museum, Budapest | 2008 What’s Up?, Mucsarnok, Budapest | 2007 Say it isn’t so, Neues Museum Weserburg, Bremen | 2006 Re_Dis_Trans, Apexart, New York; Private Matter?, Mucsarnok, Budapest | 2003 Aura, Millenáris Park, Budapest; Poesis, Mûcsarnok, Budapest; Prague Biennial | 2002 Vision, Mucsarnok, Budapest; Unstable Narratives, HartwareKunstverein, Dortmund | 2001 Climate, Mucsarnok, Budapest; Context, 49. Venice Biennial Romanian Pavillon | 1993 Ex Oriente Lux, Sala Dalles, Bucuresti, etc.
With the support of: BRD Groupe Societe Generale, Hotel Novotel, Murfatlar
Media partners: Igloo, Arhitectura, 24 Fun, feeder.ro, rfi, Cocor Media Channel
Special thanks: Szent István Király Múzeum