AVANT DE RENTRER, IL FAUT INCENDIER LA MAISON

Because the soul is progressive, it never quite repeats itself, but in every act attempts the production of a new and fairer whole. -Ralph Waldo Emerson, On Art

I can’t believe it. No, I will not lie, I can easily conceive of it. - Samuel Beckett, Molloy

If I do everything in my own interest, it is because the interest I have in myself comes before everything else. – Seneca, On Benefits

This exhibition focuses on the evolution of certain forms of production that are realized by the dismantling of external elements and uniting them into an internalized and intentionally conflicted whole. This activity is inherently schizophrenic and therefore results in a multifarious yet not unresolved output.

The title roughly translates to “before returning home you must burn down the house” – which could mean, among other things, that engaging with oneself one requires continual processes of disassembly in an effort to form a united, cohesive self. The linguistic shift in the exhibition’s title is representative of the passage from one state of being to another, with inevitable (and intentional) slippages in implication. Also at play are fractured, interrupted systems: disassembly/assembly, self/duality, subjectivity/influence, privacy/publicity, singularity/multiplicity. The exhibition seeks to locate itself in the fold between these states, in moments of transition and contradiction.

AVANT DE RENTRER, IL FAUT INCENDIER LA MAISON

artists:
Kerstin Brätsch, Nikolas Gambaroff, Lucas Knipscher, Nick Mauss, Charles Mayton, Marie Michaels, Sean Paul, Clement Rodzielski, Nora Schultz, Valerie Snobeck