Full HD video / 12ʼ05″/ sound / color
In K14, the artist is still wearing the same luminescent suit, as he moves further out into the world, into Sopnica Jelkovec, a pre-constructed district of Zagreb that was originally slated to become an affordable housing area for young people. Over the years, the project passed through the hands of various property developers and political
administrations, but it was eventually left unfinished. Currently, Sopnica Jelkovec is an ambiguous place; the flats that were built in the area were rented out at preferential rates to ethnic minorities and other groups of society that share little in common. Lacking social infrastructure, and adequate public transport, the district remains isolated at the edge of the city.
In the video, again filmed at night, the artist appears in these streets, wearing a conspicuous, light-giving suit. Bands of youths march by, two by two. Poetry of alienation and solitude is recited. Like a younger brother of James Lee Byars, the artist passes by, as if his presence could serve to illuminate the social questions raised by the new district. At the same time, the piece poses the enduring question of the artist’s function in today’s society. It is a question the artist continues to ask through the various forms he deploys, and he does so with dogged persistence. (Kate Mayne)
In colaboration: director of photography: Boris Poljak; poem: Miloš Đurđević; voice: William Linn; editing: Ana Stulina; sound: Ivan Zelić; costume design: Tonči Vladislavić;
K14 is produced by Drugi Plan, supported by HAVC- Croatian Audio Visual Centre
K14 includes poetry written by Miloš Đurđević
one dot, red, over there, blinking, no, not blinking, flickering, no, not flickering, immobile, no, not standing, does it make a sound, could it hum, does it hum, brim, immobile, it’s not light, it’s not reflection, nothing comes in, only dot, red, stands in onset, standing and outgoing, moves away, comes in, flickers inflowing in itself, into the wind, flowing of dead air, echo, white, always white, like a feather on a breeze, like a needle in a sphere it rolls, slides, flicks, seesaws, stumbling and rising, drawing close to windowless panels, it will open up, split apart, red, like a grid, like a passage by itself, walls not dividing, walls not closing in, windows without walls, a dome without pillars, narrowing and dissipating, growing into a dot and now drizzles, from one end of this square to the other, when I stand here the edge is not there near me, the edge is not there with me, here without me, but it comes back, approaches, and then it flickers, red, for a moment, echoes, unrolls in ribbons, standing still, like a line, a stroke without a sound, blinking and it is not a dot, no beginning, it won’t stop, it couldn’t stop
can I hear myself, can you hear him, nobody speaks, no talking, haven’t heard them, do you listen, they couldn’t hear them, I forget you like a wall in front of a sound, encircled cause it will ring, ringing after them, it rings, it will ring behind him, emptied out, doesn’t hear, they couldn’t hear, doesn’t hear himself – he came over fields, in darkness, following dusk, tall grasses thinning out, a hundred paces before a dike, in front of him then, now must be over there, there should be an overpass, he withdrew slowly with dusk like before, then grows into a chain of street lamps, like a fence, like a panel over grid of light, like a moat they buried later on, covered over to bring it deeper, to earth again, in earth, without soil, it rises now and sinks in thick air – if you make one step forward, and then step back, if you shift your weight from one leg to another, unnoticeably, cause nobody will hear, if you look back for a moment, if he bends and quickly rises, he couldn’t be at the same place, it’s not your place, someone else would stand behind him, are you standing behind me, where are you
in me, to mutter, for myself, not to say, he didn’t say, didn’t look, didn’t stop, in himself, if he hesitates now, if he stops, who will stop then, in his tracks, who was there, to shrink into a dot, not moving, pull behind you, in one stroke, from above, always from above, over him, where he couldn’t look, in himself, without thoughts, feelings, close down, you have to close yourself, can’t protect yourself, like in a sphere, it always comes sideways, like a look you haven’t given, it reflects, in itself, it will see you, it stares cause you couldn’t see it, like when you feverishly wish and have to think of something else, whose thought forbade him to stop then, in himself, you haven’t stopped, he couldn’t stop, and all the time something in you must always go on, cause it won’t go there, it couldn’t come there, one shouldn’t be there, won’t come back, shouldn’t stop in his tracks, in himself, breaking out of him, instantly, like a dot, withdraws and tears him apart, fast, faster, when he wouldn’t look, when he finally turns around not to see, it will close down, it will fold onto him, silently, with a bang, noiselessly, without a sound, it comes down, came down beneath him, in me