The Same Sweat is Still Flowing Through the Same Pores

2022 - 2024

Supported by: Ministry of Culture Slovenija, City of Ljubljana

In collaboration: MGLM (City Gallery), MSUM (Museum for Contemporary Art), Tobačna 001 Gallery

Thanks: Cecilija Žibert, Maja Pahor, Mia Žibert

Text by: Nina Skumavc

Foto: MGLM, MSUM, Tobačna 001

The project is a multi-year research project for the film that, through a personal narrative, addresses the history and identity of a landscape, the intertwining of personal and collective biography, and the objects and subjects of the research. The exhibitions themselves—conceived as a kind of intermediate station that enables the presentation of findings—are equally important. They serve as a site for reflection on the collected material, for experimenting with its form, and for testing relationships and effects between individual elements.

Film narration is also present within the exhibition—not only because moving images predominate, but because the artist constructs it as if thinking through film: through montage, and through considerations of space and time within the frame and beyond it. Each element is a story in itself and at the same time only a fragment—of the exhibition, of the future film, and above all of a narrative that permeates the project but is never read in a linear form. The artist lays out before us the exploration of the chosen topic and the process of material collection, both tied to a specific, selected location. At its core, the project can be said to engage with memory, the relationship between natural and built environments, and time.

Installation: videos, sound, objects, natural elements, 16mm film, 35mm film, herbarium, book

In the installation, we are surrounded by its holistic presence, which is enhanced by the multiplicity of frames in the projections and the density of the sonic narratives, while individual elements are approached gradually. The volume of material results from its continuous accumulation and multiplication, and simultaneously, the media used by the artist, her experimentation with them, and the acquisition of new knowledge constantly open up new possibilities for its presentation. The sensory installation combines both contemporary and analog technologies: analog 16mm and 35mm film, projections, animation, light objects, natural objects, a kinetic object, sound, and text. The viewer can immerse themselves in the sensory stimuli, while a special atmosphere is created through lighting – which loosens the physical boundaries of perception. The audience is allowed to move among the presented elements and observe the installation from different perspectives, encouraging reflection on their own perception. The artist creates situations – dissecting and opening up the multilayered nature of the material and perspectives on it, with the aim that the observer may continue to construct meaning on their own.

Excerpt from a text by [Nina Skumavc]