Venetian blind and him
This work premiered in the "Face to Face" exhibition at Galerie Gabriele Rivet Köln (Cologne), from October 30 - December 21, 2002, and was alternately shown with "Venetian Blind and Her". The gallery has a special feature within its space: a window connects one room with the corridor. Thus the inside wall of the gallery seems like the outside wall of a building. (This architectural absurdity evolved when a roof was placed over the courtyard, integrating it into the gallery on the ground floor of the building.) During the exhibition, a white, plastic venetian blind hung in the window (1 x 1.6 meters in size), and served as a projection screen. A man was projected in life-size from inside of the room. He seemed to be moving behind the Venetian blind from the perspective of the corridor.
The video was filmed through the slats of a black Venetian blind. The slats are first closed; the man opens them and then changes his clothes, talks on the phone, drinks beer, alternately opens and closes the slats, and pulls the blind up and down. The structures of the real and the projected venetian blinds overlap and can hardly be distinguished from one another. The viewer becomes confused because it sometimes seems as though the real venetian blind were moving. The video does not have much sound. One only hears something when the man touches the blind, causing it to rattle or squeak. The venetian blind is thus once again stressed as a interface where the projected/virtual and real world of images meet.
The blind represents an adjustable barrier against unwanted (in)sights or gazes, but also naturally intensifies the viewer's curiosity. A normal gaze becomes a voyeuristic one. But the person being watched gazes back. The man behind the venetian blind also brings the viewer into focus through a pair of binoculars and a camera.
Actor: Ingo Kukatz