intervention statement: laredo 001
AMARIE BERGMAN
For the first site of laredo, Amarie Bergman introduces a spontaneous intervention into a small residential room and its space-time. She assembled a group of found, geometric objects, each balanced by its own weight, but couldn’t help noticing that these components “…could be ongoing, they could keep growing and changing, or perhaps they could suddenly deconstruct, dissolve or disappear before our eyes.” [1]
001 conveys “unelaborated spatial relationships” [2]. The commonality of circular shapes sets them up to being thought of as related. That said, Bergman has a history of underpinning her solo exhibitions by means of unseen thematic order. This one draws on an essence of the ‘codes’ of basic geometry informed by a chance encounter in a waiting room with recent archeological correlations between world-wide written symbols [3] and a re-encounter with the title of Paul Gauguin’s 1897 painting, “Where Do We Come From / What Are We / Where Are We Going?”
To make minimalist art in the 21st century, while contemplating the precision of geometry, the visual language of our distant yet collective ancestors, and the possible answers to ever-mystifying questions, equates to a veritable streamline. This kind of art seems to be a physical condensation expanded by metaphysically editing - yet uniting - the past and the future. Evidence of a simultaneous ‘attemptation’ exists in the present via 001.
[1] Dansaekhwa https://www.ideelart.com/magazine/dansaekhwa-korean-painting
[2] Gerald Nordland, Richard Diebenkorn [New York: Rizzoli 1987] 214.
[3] Alison George, Hidden Symbols - article in New Scientist: The Collection / Civilization pages 29-31 - on Genevieve von Petzinger, archaeologist and author of The First Signs. Von Petzinger theorised that not only do written geometric symbols go back at least 200,000 years ago, encoding and transmitting information, but there is clear evidence that they had identical meanings for our European, African and Australian ancestors.
laredo 001
1/23 Scott Street, Melbourne
03 October – 04 October 2019
https://www.amariebergman.com/gallery/images-laredo-001
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