jan de cock - museumdd.be 57_66_lr.pdf · 1307 tommaso chiaretti, l’avventura de michelangelo...

Occupying the Museum 57 Jan De Cock

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recalls the distinctive dolly shots in Andrei Tarkovsky’s films inwhich the camera frame finds another framing device withinthe scene. A camera travels slowly past a window (such as theburnt out truck window in Stalker), or approaches and thenpasses through a door (like the back door of the childhoodhome in Mirror). Within the narrative context of these films,suspense is tinged with unspecified dread and/or wonder —such as one might feel in a dream. In the more open context inwhich a spectator navigates De Cock’s artworks, the purely for-mal aspects of such suspense come to the fore: it is the consis-tently fragmentary nature of these views that makes themintriguing. For the Romantics, the fragment stood for whatcould not be seen (what lay beyond the pictured window frame,or what the lone walker saw as he looked out across mountaintops). In a Romantic vein then, De Cock’s suspenseful structureis a device that illuminates snapshot details in order to drawattention to the wider frameworks of vision. Using filmicanalogies to frame our movements, De Cock prompts us toreflect on the nature of mobility and perception, and their linkswith desire and knowledge.

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GRIDS AND FRAGMENTS

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1303 Temps Mort IX. Sunshine State, neg. NY_22_28, b/w print in wenge frame

1304 Denkmal 5-12-3, Minami Aoyama 5-12-3, Minato-ku, Tokyo, 2005

1305 Temps Mort IX. Long Island, neg. NY_30_17/18, b/w print in wenge frame

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Encyclopedia Denkmal Volume I, Denkmal ISBN 9080842419, 2004, p. 249, 2:19:53 PM

16 bip Construction works of Vertigo or the Era of free Catalogues, in the framework of the exhibition Beeld in Park in

the Felix Hap Park in Brussels, 2000

15 bip Vertigo or the Era of Free Catalogues






11a bip Vertigo or the Era of Free Catalogues








02b bip Vertigo or the Era of Free Catalogues

02a bip Vertigo or the Era of Free Catalogues


11b bip Vertigo or the Era of Free Catalogues


1306 Temps Mort II, Vienna, neg. 1470_22-23, b/w print in wenge frame, see Volume I, p. 258, 2:27:48 PM

1307 Tommaso Chiaretti, L’Avventura de Michelangelo Antonioni, Paris: Buchet and Chastel, 1961

1308 Temps Mort IV. Munich, neg. 1471_12, b/w print in wenge frame. Haus der Kunst. The Glass Palace that burnt down

in 1931 was replaced by a neoclassicist temple, designed by Paul Ludwig Troost who was “the first architect of the

Führer”. The “Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung” took place in this museum. The “Entartete Kunst” exhibition

also took place in Munich in the same year on the second floor of a building formerly occupied by the Institute of

Archaeology. Viewers had to reach the exhibit by means of a narrow staircase. The rooms were made of temporary

partitions and deliberately chaotic and crowded. The contrast with the spacious rooms in the Haus der Kunst was

striking

1309 Temps Mort IX. Sunshine State, Everglades National Park, neg. NY_14_35, b/w print in wenge frame

1310 Temps Mort IX. Sunshine State, Juan J. Peruyero Museum, also named Bay of Pigs Museum, neg. NY_23_09, b/w

print in wenge frame

1311 Temps Mort IV. Munich, Haus der Kunst, neg. 1471_10-11, b/w print in wenge frame. The Glass Palace that burnt

down in 1931 was replaced by a neoclassicist temple, designed by Paul Ludwig Troost who was “the first architect

of the Führer”. The “Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung” took place in this museum. The “Entartete Kunst” exhi-

bition also took place in Munich in the same year on the second floor of a building formerly occupied by the Institute

of Archaeology. Viewers had to reach the exhibit by means of a narrow staircase. The rooms were made of tempo-

rary partitions and deliberately chaotic and crowded. The contrast with the spacious rooms in the Haus der Kunst

was striking

1312 Denkmal 2, Astillero Ascorreta 2, Pasajes San Pedro, San Sebastian, 2004

1313 Temps Mort X. Japan, Tokyo, neg. T_13_05, b/w print in wenge frame

1314 Temps Mort IX. New York, Museum of Modern Art, neg. NY_31_21, b/w print in wenge frame. Group portret of

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statement echoes Moholy-Nagy’s view of film as an articulationof ‘the vision in motion of a motorised world’.

Movement, we thus notice, is registered visually as perceptualdisplacement, and this can occur whether it is the viewer who ismoving, or the thing he beholds. This equivalence is demon-strated by the confusing sensation of movement experienced bya stationary train passenger when an adjacent train moves off.The illusion of movement in these cases is dependent on thesurrounding view being masked beyond the parameters of thecarriage window, as a wider view would supply reference pointsclarifying what is moving in relation to what. The view of themoving camera also masks its wider surroundings (in particularits own means of locomotion) so the relative positioning ofmoving camera and moving subject is always in play, and closecropping can give rise to ambiguity. For Arnheim, “[t]he oldeffect, namely the moving landscape, is arrived at from anentirely new starting point, and in the process the principle ofrelativity, on which the effect is based, is formulated explicitly:in motion pictures, movement is not absolute but always relat-ed to the station point of the camera”.14 A moving shot moreclosely resembles everyday vision than a static shot, certainly,but there is a distinction to be made between everyday visionfacilitated by virtually unconscious head movement (vision

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1326 Casa del Fauno, Atrium, Pompei Scavi, archaeological site

1327 a Denkmal 55, National Museum of History, Boulevard of the Martyrs for the Country, Tirana, Albania, 2003. Slide 22,

see Volume I, p. 267, 2:33:12 AM

1327 b Denkmal 55, National Museum of History, Boulevard of the Martyrs for the Country, Tirana, Albania, 2003. Slide 25

1327 c Denkmal 55, National Museum of History, Boulevard of the Martyrs for the Country, Tirana, Albania, 2003. Slide 06,



1329 Temps Mort VII. Moscow. Neg. 4038-12, b/w print in wenge frame. The Melnikov House is situated close to Old

Arbat Street in Moscow. Viktor Konstantinovich Melnikov, the son of the architect Konstantin Melknikov, is still

living in his father’s house today at the age of 92. In his will Viktor Melnikov has left the house to the Russian state,

on the condition that they create a House-museum in it and have it restored

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144 Victor Horta, Palace of Fine Arts in Brussels, Sculpture Hall, Cross section towards the big stairs (level of the

Ravenstein Street)

147 René Daniels, The return of the performance (De terugkeer van de performance), 1987

738 Yakov Chernichov, Petrovsky Alphabet. Paper, gouache and ink, 50,3 x 69,9 cm

782 Palazzina dei Mulini, Hall. Residence of Napoleon on Elba Island

578 Georges Vantongerloo, y = x - 11x + 10, 1935. Mahogany, 50 x 35 x 30 cm

359 Vertigo or the Era of free Catalogues, exhibition in W139, Amsterdam, curated by Jean-Bernard Koeman.

358 Vertigo or the Era of free Catalogues, exhibition in W139







382 Fons Welters walking back into the gallery after buying another four crates of beer

433 Vertigo or the Era of Free Catalogues, installation made within the framework of Beeld in park in the Felix Hap Park

in Brussels, 2000. The pavilion functioned as entrance party for the exhibition

434 Vertigo or the Era of Free Catalogues, installation made in the framework of Beeld in park

442 Installation view of Jan De Cock’s solo exhibition Vertigo or the Era of free Catalogues deel 1 in Argos, Werfstraat 13 ,

1000 Brussel

441 Installation view of Jan De Cock’s solo exhibition Vertigo or the Era of free Catalogues deel 1 in Argos, Werfstraat 13 ,

1000 Brussel

440 Installation view of Jan De Cock’s solo exhibition Vertigo or the Era of free Catalogues deel 1 in Argos



451 Booth of the Fons Welters Gallery at Art Cologne, designed by Jan De Cock

365 Photo taken by Jan De Cock as documentation on his exhibition Vertigo or the Era of free Catalogues that took place

in 2000 in ‘Centrum voor Beeldende Kunst’ in Dordrecht (Holland)

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1325 Temps Mort IX. New York, Waldorf Astoria Hotel, neg. NY_08_18, b/w print in wenge frame

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11:25:45 AmM O D U LE LX X I I

1356 Temps Mort VII. Moscow, Bank of the river Moskva, neg. 4067_22-23, b/w print in wenge frame, see Volume I, p.

291, 2:41:42 PM

1357 Jean-Luc Godard, Histoire(s) du cinéma. Le control de l’univers. Les signes parmi nous, 1998. Filmstill, see Volume I, p.

31, 8:54:05 AM


1359 Denkmal 47, Stella Lohaus Gallery, Vlaamse Kaai 47, Antwerpen, 2004

1360 Jean-Luc Godard, Histoire(s) du cinéma. Le control de l’univers. Les signes parmi nous, 1998. Filmstill. La page cachée,


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327 El Lissitzky, Of Two Squares: A Suprematist Tale in Six Constructions, 1922. Ed.: unknown (plus 50 hardbound, signed

and numbered), letterpress, 27,9 x 22,5 cm

343 Photo taken by Jan De Cock on the night of the opening of the exhibition of Dan Graham in the Kröller Möller

Park in November 2001. In the background you can see the museum building designed by Henry van de Velde and

two adjacent pavillions by Dan Graham.

745 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Barcelona Pavilion, 1928-9

731 Gerhard Richter, Exhibition in Museum Haus Esters in Krefeld (designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe between

1928 and 1930) and the Museum of Modern art in Frankfurt am Main

728 Joseph Beuys, Plate of yellow glass

733 Yakov Chernikhov, Graphic composition with an architectural theme, 1920’s, paper en color pencils, 11,8 x 12 cm

725 Donald Judd. View of the second floor of the former Marfa National Bank, Donald Judd’s architecture studio, Marfa,

Texas

769 Michael Asher, Palace of Fine Arts in Brussels, 1992

783 Palazzina dei Mulini, Study-Room of Paolina. Residence of Napoleon on Elba Island

795 Michael Asher, Installation Münster, contribution to Skulptur Ausstellung in Münster 1977 and to Skulptur Projekte in

Münster 1987, caravan in changing locations, 19 different sites in and around Münster, parking position of 1st week

823 Construction of the provisional facade of the Albertina Library on the Mount of Arts in Brussels

825 Construction of the final facade of the Albertina Library on the Mount of Arts in Brussels

824 The provisional facade of the Albertina Library on the Mount of Arts in Brussels, 1961

964 Henry van de Velde, Hoenderloo Museum (Holland), 1921-1929. East facade

1008 Jean-Luc Godard, Histoire(s) du cinéma. Le control de l’univers. Les signes parmi nous, 1998. Filmstill

1361 Temps Mort IX. New York, Metropolitan Museum, neg. NY_03_09, b/w print in wenge frame. Emile Antoine

Bourdelle, Herakles Archer. The archer is one of Bourdelle’s most famous sculptures and brought him international

recognition when first exhibited at the 1910 Paris Salon. It was inspired by the archer on the Temple of Athena at

Aegina

1362 Jean-Luc Godard, Histoire(s) du cinéma. La monnaie de l’absolu. Une vague nouvelle, 1998. Filmstill. Une forme, see

Volume I, p. 225, 2:24:15 PM

1363 Jacques Belmans, Cinéma et Violence, Mons: La Renaissance du Livre, 1972


1365 Temps Mort IX. Sunshine State, Juan J. Peruyero Museum, also named Bay of Pigs Museum, neg. NY_23_17/18, b/w

print in wenge frame

1366 Construction Module M24-D15-17022005 L. Exploded view

1367 Temps Mort IX. New York, Waldorf Astoria Hotel, neg. NY_08_22, b/w print in wenge frame

1368 Jean-Luc Godard, Histoire(s) du cinéma. Toutes les histoires. Une histoire seule, 1998. Filmstill. The world, see Volume

I, p. 78, 10:40:01 AM

1369 Temps Mort IX. New York, Whitney Museum, neg. NY_27_14/15, b/w print in wenge frame

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entire civilisation breaks apart to form another kind of order. Afilm is capable of picking up the pieces”.22 Smithson suggestedthat artists in the 1960s sought to ‘frame’ abstract culturalframes, to make these frames visible, and at the same timeproblematise faith in them as abstractions by replaying themwithin the transient and arbitrary frames of cinematic film.

De Cock offers a similarly self-conscious framing of contem-porary cultural frames in an artistic practice that acknowledgesthe increased ubiquity of film and virtuality since Smithson’sera. In the case of Denkmal 7, what we might call the ‘grids andgeometries’ of film itself, as well as the architecture of a par-ticular site, are conceptually echoed, literally framed and thussculpturally highlighted. De Cock’s futuristic ruin is a mise-en-scène that stages the disjunctive and transient nature of percep-tion and makes it visible. Our current culture’s abstractions andframeworks emerge — partially excavated — in the splinteredviews and kaleidoscopic reflections playing across the surfacesof the dazzling monolith.

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ry, each one manifesting a divergence”. 17 Nietzsche protestedagainst the formal apparatus of classic perspectivism whichguaranteed “the possibility of disengaging, of switching fromone point of view to another”.18 He objected to the idea thatthe world existed objectively, that different views of it must beconsistent with each other and thus the whole might be recon-structed from any combination of angles. This amounts to anillusory abstraction, while disjunctive and disorienting imagesmay give the viewer a glimpse of the ‘polymorphic’ or undif-ferentiated real (ie the real before the brain has ‘ordered’ it),exposing and disrupting the habitual imposition of perceptualorder that Nietzsche mistrusted.

In one of the early scenes of Jean-Luc Godard’s Alphaville, afeeling of disorientation is established when both the camera(which has adopted the protagonist’s point of view) and thevarious doors in the hotel entrance, lobby and lift are set inmotion, all at once. The reflective expanses of glass and slidingchrome doors cause successive displacements in their sur-roundings that make the scene difficult to decipher. This scenerecalls another in Murnau’s The Last Laugh, where a camera(which has been mounted on a bicycle) enters a lift, anddescends into the entrance hall of a grand hotel. As it travels,Gilles Deleuze remarks in Cinema 1, the camera performs

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Notes1. De Cock’s various Denkmäler thus recall two divergent art historical models: the two-dimensional side views resemble the abstract compositions of Piet Mondrian, while thethree-dimensional serial components invoke the systematic industrial progressions ofDonald Judd. References to Mondrian’s universalist modernist vision are thus broughtinto productive tension with Judd’s intent focus on the here and now: 1920s Neo-Platonism and ‘spirit’ vie with 1960s Pragmatism and the concrete ‘object[0]’.[0]2. Paul Virilio, Polar Inertia (trans. Patrick Camiller), London: Sage, 2000, p. 72.3. László Moholy Nagy, ‘Space-Time Problems’, in Richard Kostelanetz (ed),Esthetics Contemporary, Buffalo NY: Prometheus Books, 1989, p. 69.4. Moholy Nagy, ‘Space-Time Problems’, p. 73.5. Chris Dercon, ‘A Completely Different Idea, Elsewhere’, in Jan De Cock.Denkmal ISBN 9080842419, Brussel: Atelier Jan De Cock, 2004, p. 65.6. Ian Chambers explains how a cinematic model might come to determine aspectsof visuality more broadly: “As a language, as an economic and cultural institution, away of picturing and enframing the world, cinema contributes to the making of thevisualscapes, soundscapes and culturalscapes in which we move [...]. This perhapssuggests that we should [...] consider cinema as one of the languages we inhabit,dwell in, and in which we, our histories, cultures and identities are constituted[...].Languages, whether literary, cinematic, musical or verbal, and even if often depend-ent upon quite precise techno-cultural systems, are not turned on and off by theflick of a switch. They persist and permeate our world. They ghost our presence andcirculate beyond our individual volition. As part and parcel of the ecology of ourlives, they exist prior to our knowing and this informs our being and becoming.They are irreducible to a medium or technology. They are part of our understand-ing”. See Iain Chambers, ‘Maps, Movies, Music and Memory’, in David B Clarke(ed), The Cinematic City, New York: Routledge, 1997, pp. 230-231.7. Virilio, Polar Inertia, p. 27.8. Virilio, Polar Inertia, pp. 20-21.9. André Bazin, What is Cinema? (trans. Hugh Gray), Berkeley and Los Angeles:University of California Press 1967 p 166

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jan de cock - museumdd.be 57_66_lr.pdf · 1307 tommaso chiaretti, l’avventura de michelangelo...

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