Et sic in infinitum
New Florence Biennale 2013, Florence (Italy),
Curated by Rolando Bellini
THE CONTENT
Beat Kuert realizes the opening event for ninth edition of the New Florence Biennale inspiring his work to the philosopher and alchemist, who lived between 1574 and 1637, Robert Fludd, author of books and treatises in which esotericism and occultism are mixed with scientific observations. His book Utriusque Cosmi, maiores Scilicet et minores, metaphysica, physica atque technica Historia is preceded by an image: a black square that bears on each side the wording Et sic in Infinitum. The artist Beat Kuert stages the creation through a performance designed to completely immerse the viewer who will physically be inside the work of art.
THE REALIZATION
The space is a crucial factor in the installation setting; specifically it recreates the wall to go beyond. At the centre of the room there is a black square, above there a cube of Plexiglas take place, you cannot see what is inside, it is covered with clay, you can only catch a glimpse of it. Inside the performers, also covered with clay, move slowly, they double over trying to get out and they look for the edge of the small space they are enclosed. All around endless writings surrounds them. The gigantic artworks placed on three sides of the room are intricate windows on another dimension, far more complex, far more fascinating than the plastic frontiers. The beauty of its scenes is in the multiplicity, a "horror vacui" made of accumulation and eclecticism, the unsettling combination of his images, in the eradication feeling, in the distortion of the clean forms torn from ordinary perfection, searching for the extremes.
THE MESSAGE
Our world is like that cube: it develops from a base, which already has in its conception all that can become and infinitely it expands in languages that sometimes we can't understand. Men are locked in, tight spaces, which are mental or physical; they are asphyxiated and do not see, nor joy, nor possibilities. When all around them there are a multitude of visions and codes, they suffer the voids where they are confined; crossing these limits is the movement to accomplish.
