Kathrin Becker
"Overexposed", 2003, consists of a fur-trimmed hood installed
with the opening facing the wall where there is a circle of neon light; from
time to time a male voice echoes, repeating the phrase "I'm overexposed". This
talking head - wich emphatically marked the entrance area to Rui Calçada
Bastos's exhibition "It's not romantic to be romantic" in the Künstlerhaus
Bethanien, in Berlin - moves within the spectrumranging from irony to melancholy,
wich is typical for a series of works by this author.
What predominates here is above all the phrase "I'm
overexposed", repeated like a formula for
self-invocation. In theart world it is generally
stated that someone is overexposed in the context of
excessive presence at exhibitions,that is, when an
artistic career - normally of a young artist - is
started in a dizzingly rapid manner in advance
anticipation of the market laws, often making the
zenith of this sudden sucess go by very quickly,
plunging the artist into a no man's land of public
oblivion. And it is a cynical statement in the sense
that the art world, in all of its hierarchies and
functions (exhibitions of an institutional nature,
gallerieactivity, art criticism), on the one hand may
feverishly promote this dynamics of swift success yet
on the other, in its permanent search for new names,
soon loses its pleasure for last season's toy. Over
the last decade there has been even less constancy in
this area than what has been practised in the field of
fashion or pop music, wich are equally voracious
sectors, of wich it is said that they have remain
faithful at least to one name and only demand to be
permanently supplied with new artefacts.
However, in the case of the repeated phrase in
"Overexposed", the voice is in first person, so it is
not the art world that we are hearing but the artist.
This statement guives a voice to the disquiet of the
artistic subject metaphorically created by Rui Calçada
Bastos. Consequently we are iin the presence of the
voice of the superimposition of the identity of this
artist with that of the critic who is the adversary of
his career, for whom he has become irredeemably lost
in the sense of the "Stockholm Syndrome", designating
the emergence of a positive emotional relationship
between the kidnapper and the hostage. Just as the
artistic subject previously - during the building of
the success - followed the demands of the art world
through incessant obedience and compliance with the
plans, now he also carries out his own decline with
equal discipline, wich is brought forward in a sort of
self-fulfilling prophecy. The phrase that is repeated
from time to time thus simultaneously takes on the
character of a confession and a mantra.
This ironic comment on the artist's self perception
and the perception of others in the art world is
over-emphasised through the formal elements in the
isntallation "Overexposed". In the first place we have
the hood's function of representation as it takes
place of the head of the artistic subject it
symbolises, one the one hand a disappointed distancing
from the world, in the sense that it directs the face
opening toward the wall; on the other hand, in a
second reading, it may also be taken as an expression
of shame in relation to this capitulation itself.
The hood itself already points towards this, as both
the hiding one's head and turning away one's face are
also historically expressions of sadness, shame and
recognition of one's own guilt. Finally, the choice of
the material for the hood - a heavy, warm cloth - and
the application of fur around it symbolises the cold
and hostility of the surrounding atmosphere, wich has
removed its attention and complacency from the
artistic subject.
Another element full of meaning is the circle of cold neon light set up on the
wall towards wich the face-hole on the hood is turned. Light represents knowledge
and is responsible for clarity; thus, the imaginary artistic subject has his
face turned to the light and is analysing his situation with cold clarity. But
this light may also intend to insinuate, as an elementof elevation and of the
beyond, that the artistic subject disappears into nothingness in it.
Kathrin Becker for Anamnese
www.anamnese.pt
