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Your Chair
Siena, Venezia, Italy ; Heidelberg, Germany ; Klagenfurt, Austria ; Scottsdale, Arizona ; New York City, NY ; Evanston, Illinois ; Hamilton, Ontario ; Belgrade, Serbie 2001 - 2004 |
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A single folding chair is visible in the installation. It is placed under the inscription: YOU MAY TAKE THIS CHAIR INTO THE STREET AND ASK FOR MONEY. Visitors are free to follow the invitation and remove the chair or to accept it as art and leave the installation unchanged. However, as a chair is removed, another replaces it.
The installation addresses a voluntary, temporary shift of perspective whose justification lies solely within oneself and the experience gained from it. Although it contains an element of criticism, in that it addresses the themes of begging and poverty, the work is essentially poetic at heart.
In The Divine Comedy, the travellers encounter Provencal Salvani, once a powerful citizen of Siena (he had led its army to victory in battle with the Florentines). Salvani has to do penance in Purgatory, rather than Hell, because he voluntarily begged for money with which to buy the freedom of a friend captured during the battle.
Your Chair, which was first created for the exhibition Il Dono in the Palazzo delle Papesse in Siena alludes to a different interpretation of this episode, according to which Salvani must suffer for having begged despite his great wealth, thus without need. The act of begging without need is a metaphor for the artwork, which, despite its contingency and the commitment it requires, always involves a certain aspect of irrationality.
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| © Gerz studio, 2004 |
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| © Klaus Meyer, 2004 |
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