A Blind Spot

Curator Catherine David expands her ongoing study of the various protocols set by artists in order to question the paradigms defining canonical forms of documentary.

The project evolves around key art works from the past fifteen years as well as new pieces that explore the link between aesthetics, history and politics. “A Blind Spot” thus introduces aesthetic methods that wilfully suspend immediacy, transparency and coherence as devices conventionally enlisted to render perceptions of “truth”. Instead, the project focuses on inevitably filtered perception, on the opacity of reality and history, on the “blind spot” where the categories of fiction and fact no longer prevail. David’s prologue to a subsequent exhibition (BDF 2,2012) highlights the work of artist Joachim Koester, who explores the tension between imaginary sites, aesthetic tropes and physical places. In “Morning of the Magicians” (2005) and in “One + One + One” (2006), Koester visits a house in Cefalú, Sicily, known as “The Abbey of Thelema”, which once served as a communal home for the occultist Aleister Crowley and his group of devotees.

A conversation between Catherine David and Joachim Koester will take place on Friday, June 4th, 2010, 4.30 pm.