Mirosław Bałka

You see what you see, almost nothing, that is, or merely a piece of wall, its surface a bit rough, slightly dirty here and there. A wall that people have lived with for some time now. Every now and then the light on it changes slightly – clouds, perhaps, that are passing by outside. What is really conspicuous, however, is the unsteady movement of this image of a wall. The view of the surface is not fixed but rather moves irregularly, sometimes to the side, at other times upwards or downwards. The movement is not quite purposeful, more unintentional: The arm that holds the camera is getting tired. The sluggish swaying, the hesitant wandering of the gaze is intensified even more by the type of projection, with the video covering the entire surface of a wall that stands in the middle of the room. The doubling and superimposition of the motif brings the film image into the real space. It is less the wall itself, however, which becomes the body, and more the physical experience of the uninterrupted staring at the wall that we are confronted with.

Looking at the empty wall may be an expression of boredom, an image of time simply passing by, time to kill perhaps. The triviality of this surface, however, and the inanity of this object also create room for seeing; inevitably and unintentionally, it shifts over into a form of thinking that precedes or follows it, namely that of sensing. It is not free of melancholy or futility; it is a kind of vegetative form of reflection, a pause in the voluntary part of life, an opening for new ideas as well as for those same things that are always the same and never let you go. It is no coincidence that The Wall is being shown in this exhibition […] next to BlueGasEyes: a response, a resonance space, a liberation?

Julian Heynen

In the exhibition:

The Wall, 2006
Plywood, DVD projection, loop, no sound
210 × 280 cm
Video, 4:12 min
Courtesy of the artist + White Cube

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