Mixed media installation, 3-channel video and performance
Galerie Stanislas Bourgain, Paris
Hours performed: 18
It aims at showing Russia (as well as the rest of the world) anticipating catastrophe.
It talks about sufferings that people experience once facing starvation; explore their fears and desperate struggle against calamity. The mourning is also extended to the social practice of aggregating and storing food products in anticipation of warfare and famine. Thus, the viewer has the opportunity to commemorate the soviet kitchen that lived in the late 20th century and feel the wake for the shopping items which any soviet individual would start storing up immediately once having a god feeling for hunger.
This is a meditation intended to protect ourselves against potential disaster.
The hunger meditation comes in a form of buddhist ritual - as if a monk was sitting on the floor slowly moving pieces in front of him. In this case there is no human being seen, only artist's hands slowly moving objects such as canned meat, salt, matches, bread crunches, soap etc.
The installation consists of 3 video pieces all representing meditative rituals in attempt to prevent the global famine. The 2 smaller videos on sides show a man standing in front of the stove and a woman holding a chair - both performing repetitive movements. The main (central) video is showing a kitchen table with most needed items from a soviet time wish list.
photos by Clement Pascal