GEORGE RIPPON AT YEAH BRUSSELS
"Natural Light"
- Until 30.07.2022
Dear Visitor,
This is the place saying something
about enlightenment, illumination, mood,
about altering air and observing time
Here too a little request for apology;
A burnt offering to the pillars of society
Something nice and tasteful
Would you light my candle?
The act of lighting the candles and managing the space places one in the activity of the work. There have been alterations to the space besides the addition of the parts of the work.
The process of preparing involved driving the trash to the local trash dump, sweeping the floor and walls, as well as a ladder to remove the cobwebs, dirt and dust covering the window overhead from the entrance doors. Two overhead safety lights have been disabled. There was also maintenance executed - removal of overgrowth, repainting the floor and doors, sanding and oiling the exposed wood. There was a rotten box covering some cables that had to be removed.
Some idea, realized quickly, what does it need? There is stuff there already. To light the driveway, to point to something. Detailed with medieval Scandinavian design, penetrating pastoral into the modernist mortar. This looks like the entry to a garden party, something for an event. So then there’s an event, beer and wine would be served. After that there are little parts left behind: forged iron, wax, soot, empty bottles to be cleared. A pair of battery powered transistor radios play a local classical music station in analog surround sound - in this case either Klara or Musiq3 - purely for atmosphere enhancement. Light and space, ornament and (nostalgia) sentimentality, history and technology, a meditation. Something about the dark ages…
The work is a bit abstract: is it the glow on the wall, or in the gaps in between? Is it the time spent watching and waiting, a social time lapse? Or is it just refuse, as listed above? If we continually reference the past we should end at the flame, gazing into the mystery of discovery : basic needs, warmth, light, comprehension of nature, control over surroundings, something more than ourselves, the unknown.
The small path to the great blight - there is the future, burning bright and fading.
I’ve been working a lot on backgrounds these days, abstract and concrete spaces waiting for content. In that vein, there are two invitation images: one is the title centered on a black background with an image of a burning candle underlaid in the letters. It seems a bit too obvious.The other is of a baby’s hand reaching onto the glowing seat of a chair with the title in white on the top. It has a 70’s feel. This is the image that was used for email and Instagram promotion of the exhibition opening.
Should there be a photo of a long haired man in the nude from behind, holding a baby, the head tilted
to show the ear of the child, without face, just so?
