UdK Berlin Rundgang 2021

Friction that doesn't stop

Juan Pablo Gaviria Bedoya

This project arises from the eviction of an antique store called KUNST UND CHAOS. The experience of its gradual disappearance, along with some other stores in the area, triggered questions and reflections about space-time, emptiness, uncertainty and distance. In times of confinement and pandemic, space-time notions have been the object of discussion and have fought not only in their physical interpretations, but also in their emotional dimensions. This sensitive character has opened the way to new ways of relating to dichotomies such as inside-outside, day-night or light-darkness. And it is due to these recurring concerns that have appeared rethinking about time and its configuration thanks to the perception of movement, a movement that thanks to its restriction has taken on other nuances. The current state of the project is presented as a three-channel video installation. The images of the installation show an experimental montage of the performative reading action that I carried out in front of the antique store. My voice is transmitted by means of a laser device that sends audible waves through the empty warehouse and is amplified on the other side of the showcases by means of another device that receives light waves. This action was carried out as a poetic gesture of reflection on space and the paradox of a confinement that brought with it the increase of emptiness. The performance is a reading of notes made during the time of confinement and the devices used are a project of transmission and reception of sound waves by means of laser light (light amplified by emission of stimulated radiation) that I have been developing as part of my research project on affective specialties and temporalities in my program of arts and media studies at the UdK.

Context