MIRCEA CANTOR – HISTORY IS JUST A BULLET ON YOUR TIMELINE
2018-10-01An acute visitor will notice that the coloured arc on the exterior façade of the gallery – entitled “Double rainbow” –, which marks the beginning of the exhibition doesn’t assume the Parnassian dimension that it would seem to incarnate. Indeed, we are first challenged by the barbed wire pattern that forms these chromatic arcs. Then, an addition of interrogations linked to the notion of identity burst in while the visitor realizes that these iron brambles are painted from the tip of the artist’s fingers as he meticulously affixed his fingerprints next to each other. If the mathematical sense of identity is defined by two confounded elements that nothing can dissociate, contemporary societies more often prefer the antonymic definition referring to what differentiates and separates us from each other. These are the same societies in which each fingerprint ends up opening this or that access, this or that door but can also be used to identify a Human being and define his freedom and even sometimes his destiny. If the rainbow metaphorically expresses for some the symbol of the alliance between God and men, the artist’s interpretation seems to underline the profound antagonisms in which Humanity often dives into and of which the barbed wire are the sad material evidence.
Opposite – Tableaux, 2014-2018
Exhibition runs through to November 17th, 2018
VNH Gallery
108 rue Vieille du Temple
75003 Paris
France
