Since the post-industrial age, the landscape has been controlled and developed by humankind, which has in turn “developed” our way of seeing. Seeing and defining is something the human eye does, often unconsciously. Once modern humans began to define the landscape on earth based on a common aesthetic, this gave rise to a singular value system that became embodied, and remains to this day in control of determining the fate of history, and of memory.
Whilst we live in the "development" age, how can we uncover our own, personal perspectives, and see through the flattened image of the landscape–which we think is real, but is merely framed by the homogenizing aesthetic of Modernity? In fact, there is a lot of space that could be used as a portal to see beyond the linear time of development and progress, to let our eyes "breath" with imagination and "listen" to the undercurrent that runs within.
Using a chroma key* color curtain, a man wearing a high visibility vest appears in the frame of a landscape that will be changed in the near future. The man seeks his last chance to make the undercurrent, a space of entangled memories, (his)tories and experiences, visible in the linear time that will soon take over.
* “Chroma key compositing, or chroma keying, is a visual-effects and post-production technique for compositing (layering) two images or video streams together based on color hues (chroma range). The technique has been used in many fields to remove a background from the subject of a photo or video – particularly the newscasting, motion picture, and video game industries.”
Installation with single-channel video (15’)
Exhibition view in BAK – basis voor actuele kunst - Utrecht, June 2022
Exhibition view in puntWG Civility vs Violence: Education, Art and Community as a Way to Embrace Nonviolence, Nov 2022