sarah & charles

The works Nowhere to be found/past-present are second and third, in a series of works which also include the more recent work The Hero Dies…/2008 and the pillar work; Overcast/2006.

In the sets the artists have put up, the characters are absent. The audience discovers and manipulates the story and the identity of the inhabitants based on the props on display. Each situation is a separate episode. Together the sets tell a family history; a history that is partly created by the visitor.

 

In the situation Nowhere to be found - present, the fictional character disappeared but somehow his voice got trapped into an old radio. Thus making him part of his surroundings, of his own physical space. Trough the radio he communicates with the visitor, explaining his despair and anxiety, making the visitor accessory to his story. The visitor performs the role of the witness to the action in display. Which actually, were it a book, would make him the narrator.

 

The story goes as follows: Somewhere deep below, in a complex network of corridors and cellars, a man has withdrawn from the outside world. In a small room which bares the traces

of his residence for years on end, the visitor unexpectedly arrives. The small room smells moldy and the heat is heavy. On a nightstand the radio kept playing a silent tune. After a while radio frequencies disturb the tune. Out of the distortion, a voice speaks and addresses the visitor. It’s the voice of the man to whom the room belonged. Forgotten by everyone, he has lost himself…