Fathers and Sons, Verging

God and Jesus. Erik and Ingmar Bergman. Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il. Steptoe and Son. Claudius and Nero. Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. George Bush and George W. Bush. Ben Cartwright and Little Joe. The Ghost and Hamlet. Suddhodana and Siddhārtha Gautama. Daedalus and Icarus. Willy and Biff Loman. Odysseus and Telemachus. Abraham and Isaac. Saddam and Uday Hussein. Adam and Cain. Tarzan and Korak. Jock and J.R. Ewing. John F. Kennedy and John F. Kennedy, Junior. Oedipus and Laius. Odin and Thor. Don and Michael Corleone. Bagheera and Mowgli.

To love, revere, respect, honour, bring up, please, guide, encourage, congratulate, defend, understand, influence, change, surprise, endure, appreciate, fear, envy, accuse, begrudge, distrust, hate, threaten, hinder, avenge, fail, neglect, disown, malign, repress, forget, remember, forgive, miss, mention, seek, discover, tolerate and accept.

They stand there next to each other. One leans precariously to the left. He should fall, but stands at an angle, obstinately against the laws of nature. Sometimes they exchange an absent-minded glimpse at each other. They look down at their shoes, up at the sky, still firmly anchored in their common ground. Everything is completely in order. It’s always been this way.

Then you come into the picture. You look the leaning man in the eyes and the world swings around, everything changes and the man suddenly stands upright. The status quo has been disturbed. In their imbalance they were in balance, what’s happening now? They look at each other, inquisitively and scared. The presumptions are no longer valid, they walk simultaneously out of the picture, in their own directions, to something new.

A son becomes a father and has a son. History repeats itself, but we never learn. The experience must be new every time. We are isolated links – and at the same time connected – in a chain of generations.

2008 | Responsive video installation in 5 suites |