User:Jonas Lund/Description of Work
Description 2.0
WHAT
"This Too Shall Pass" was a site specific installation, made by Anika Schwarzlose and Jonas Lund in 2011. The installation consisted of four parts, a custom built paper shredder mounted on the wall, a webcam suspended in the ceiling above the shredder, one photographic print in an edition of six and lastly a website (http://t2sp.net) displaying the view of the webcam.
The shredder, built by Rene Bakker, consisted of two standard A4 shredders taken apart, and assembled into a A2 sized one, held together with a steel frame construction. It had two steel guides attached in the back, leaning towards the wall, and in between them a sheet of plexiglass.
The print depicted an array of buttons, dials, screws and other various items in steel or plastic arranged on a grey background. In the middle there was a circle and on each side, fangs of black shaped wings. All the parts were taken from a Canon D30, one of the first professional digital single reflex cameras.
The webcam showed a, portrait oriented, birds perspective view over the installation. The webcam looked over the whole installation, the shredder on the wall and a section of the floor beneath the shredder.
HOW
The installation was shown at the Second Act festival at the Brakke Grond, Amsterdam in September 2011. When the exhibition opened, the first edition of the print was placed in the paper shredder and the installation was made active. During the exhibition, each time a visit was recorded on the website, the paper shredder turned on for a third of a second and shredded a small part of the print, this continued until the print had been destroyed.
During the exhibition, when a print had been turned into shreds, the authors emerged with white gloves on, carefully carrying the next print in the edition and placed it in the shredder. This continued until the entire edition had been depleted. The edition had been shredded in its entirety at 14:04 on the second day of the exhibition. After that point, there was a fairly large pile of shreds underneath the shredder.
WHY
By making the longevity of a work based upon it’s popularity we wanted to create a piece with a physical existence influenced by something virtual, the online user’s activity. Being in a state of constant fluctuation allowed the piece to open questions about the lifespan of a photographic work, and the conflicting values between a printed work and a digital file.
We were interested in various ways of destroying artworks, both from an art market point of view and as an artistic practice. By not allowing the work to exist beyond the scope of the exhibition, the piece is rather unsellable, as there’s only a pile of shreds left over. The work becomes the documentation, and cannot be recreated in its original state, as a contrast to the infinitely reproducible qualities of digital files.
Description 1.0
"This Too Shall Pass" was a site specific installation, made by Anika Schwarzlose and Jonas Lund, shown at the Second Act festival at the Brakke Grond, Amsterdam in September 2011. The installation consisted of four parts, a custom built paper shredder mounted on the wall, a webcam suspended in the ceiling above the shredder, one photographic print in an edition of six and a website (http://t2sp.net) displaying the view of the webcam live.
When the exhibition opened, the first edition of the print was placed in the paper shredder and the installation was activated. During the exhibition, each time a visit was recorded on the website, the paper shredder turned on for a third of a second and shredded a small part of the print, this continued until the print had been completely destroyed.
As soon as a print had been turned into shreds, the authors emerged from the crowd with white gloves on, carefully carrying the next print in the edition and placed it in the shredder. This continued until the entire edition had been depleted. The edition had been shredded in its entirety at 14:04 on the second day of the exhibition. After that point, there was a fairly large pile of shreds underneath the shredder.
The installation was documented photographing each of the different parts and how they related together. Next to that, the webcam was saving a picture every 10 seconds, which was later displayed as a time-lapse video.
Eleanor's notes:
+
- Clearly states work's form and physical components
- Concisely describes the course of the work from start to finish
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"website...displaying the view of the webcam"- what kind of view? What did it look like?- "authors emerged from the crowd" - only on the opening night? or was there a crowd every day?