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Uninformed observer might conclude that it is a photograph torn out
of the family album, which documents a moment in the past, one love
episode. If the said observer knows Dejan Kaludjerovic, the author of the
installation, he will assume that the main actors of this story are his
parents.
Memories of a past moment are never reliable. Every new
recollection of a past event makes an additional memory. Thus, the event
gets more and more dissolute in the memory, altered and distant from the
primary. Memory records are transformed, false, and never authentic, just
like this photograph.
Instead of one, we slowly reveal two photos conveyed into
electronic record and subjected to digital intervention. With the change
in the form, by turning two photos into one, the meaning has also
changed. With merging of two moments, the equation mark between the
presentation (photo) and the event itself, and also between the sign and
reference, have been erased, and the principle of equivalence have been
lost. The created performance does not have verbatim source in the real
world, but it represents the construction of a possible past reality. It
speaks of the presence of a new world where the boundaries between the
real and imaginary, true and false, past and present are being questioned,
and suggests a possibility of their complete loss. The photograph
produced in this way, addresses the needs of a different sensibility and
perception, problematizes new understanding of the reality and cognition
of the space and time. Ever more present repression of linear and logical
"cause-and-effect" principle in favor of the associative and
parallel data processing is argumented by the way the photo segment of
this installation was produced.
Domain of public, collective memory is more liable to the interventions
analogue to the work process of the artist, because it implies the
notions of social, political, and economical. Intentional interventions
in the domain of collective memory and work on forging the history have
been everyday practices at the time the photos were taken. The artist
didn't select this decades-long historical moment by chance. He recalls
the past events, the ideology of self-management socialism, times of high
living standards, great opportunities, "happy, healthy and successful"
society, easy and carefree life, and asks the question of responsibility
and guilt of his heritage. By imposing the title "What did tomorrow
bring us?", he disturbs seemingly relaxed, idyllic situation. The
question remains open, the precise answer is left out, and the
uncertainty is being intensified by a cynical view of the artist himself.
Is there anything hidden behind the question, or its meaning just does
not surpass the boundaries of rhetorical? Is the problem behind the
question just being identified, or is the guilt already been established
and the accused directly singled out? The artist's intention is elusive,
and the need for determining the meaning is being disqualified.
... sound recording evokes the water flow, it reminds of motion,
transience, course of birth, death, renewal... in cooperation with the
dominant image of the bridge in the photo it offers salvation, escape,
hope, it enables moving from one side to another, from earth to heaven,
from transience to immortality...
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