THE CELESTIAL VAULT
steel, silk screen on thermoplastic and aluminium, plaster (waxed)
98 × 100 × 75 cm, various dimensions
2024
Installation views
NAPPING IN DENSITY
KW Institute for Contemporary Arts Berlin
2024
NAPPING IN DENSITY
KW Institute for Contemporary Arts Berlin
2024
The blason anatomique was a French literary form of poetry which developed in the 16th century, parallel to the European geographical and anatomical thirst for conquest becoming visible in the anatomical theatres and extending cartographies. While the global map was constructed piece by piece through the violent invasion and occupation of water and land, the (dead) body was being dissected and displayed by male anatomists for the purpose of medical progress and demonstration of knowledge and power.
The French word blason derives from a heraldic term as it describes the arrangement of the coat of arms, but more initially the shield itself. Exclusively written by male writers, these poems competitively praised (and later on decried) particular parts of the female body. In retrospect, they can be read as a reflection of the new scientific mentality, its mastering gaze, striving for authority and its claim of ownership over the object of knowledge.
The work YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD CARRY THE CELESTIAL VAULT traces these historical scars in a constellation of objects and text.
For the sculpture reminiscent of a shield the artist translates the polygon mesh of a 3D scan of her own body (specifically the area of the shoulder girdle) into a heraldic code which reminds both to the microscopic dermal structure as well as to a cartographic image. The fractures in the pattern and the transparency of the imprinted medium tell about a vulnerability and fragility which refers to the violence that is historically until today being carried out along the disembodied scientific gaze. The need, technique and failure of shielding and protecting are being questioned and reformulated.
A second object, eluding the viewer’s gaze, senses the anatomy and materiality of the shoulder blade. The display of a table provides a mode of looking that cites the analysing view of what is isolated and detached from its context while at the same time becoming a stage for what needs to be protected. Instead of a definition of the exposed, the inscription leaves voice to a subject, that somatically ponders on the (her-)stories registered in the body.
THE WEIGHT OF WORDS
LEAVES TRACES IN THE MUSCLE TISSUE.
STRANGE HOW WE BURDEN OUR SHOULDERS
WITH THE WEIGHT OF SOMETHING
THAT DOES NOT EVEN HAVE A BODY ITSELF.
YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD CARRY THE CELESTIAL VAULT,
INSTEAD EVEN YOU BREAK UNDER THE HEAVY MUNDANE.
I IMAGINE THE VULNERABILITY OF ONE
BEING HELD BY THE SHOULDERS OF MANY.
TRYING TO WITHSTAND ALONE
I GO RIGID, I GO IRON, I GO SHARP.
CRAMPED MUSCLES,
NARROW CHEST,
HARDENED TENDONS,
INNER DISLOCATION.
HOW CAN A BODY RELEASE
THAT WHAT SITS IN ITS BONES?
I GOT TIRED LIFTING AND TENSING MY ARMS
TO CONVINCE YOU OF MY TREMENDOUS POWER.
THE CLOSER YOU’RE BREATHING DOWN MY NECK
THE MORE OPAQUE I WILL BECOME.
WHAT YOU HAVE SEEN WAS NEVER MEANT TO BE
NEITHER FOR MY FEET NOR MY EYES.
NOW
I WILL NOT LET IT FALL ON MY BACK
AGAIN.
LEAVES TRACES IN THE MUSCLE TISSUE.
STRANGE HOW WE BURDEN OUR SHOULDERS
WITH THE WEIGHT OF SOMETHING
THAT DOES NOT EVEN HAVE A BODY ITSELF.
YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD CARRY THE CELESTIAL VAULT,
INSTEAD EVEN YOU BREAK UNDER THE HEAVY MUNDANE.
I IMAGINE THE VULNERABILITY OF ONE
BEING HELD BY THE SHOULDERS OF MANY.
TRYING TO WITHSTAND ALONE
I GO RIGID, I GO IRON, I GO SHARP.
CRAMPED MUSCLES,
NARROW CHEST,
HARDENED TENDONS,
INNER DISLOCATION.
HOW CAN A BODY RELEASE
THAT WHAT SITS IN ITS BONES?
I GOT TIRED LIFTING AND TENSING MY ARMS
TO CONVINCE YOU OF MY TREMENDOUS POWER.
THE CLOSER YOU’RE BREATHING DOWN MY NECK
THE MORE OPAQUE I WILL BECOME.
WHAT YOU HAVE SEEN WAS NEVER MEANT TO BE
NEITHER FOR MY FEET NOR MY EYES.
NOW
I WILL NOT LET IT FALL ON MY BACK
AGAIN.