a half mile of string is based on the 17th century satirical text Another world and yet the same by satirist and moralist Joseph Hall. The text describes two countries with the same latitudes and longitudes as England and Germany, where food and drink are the main industries.
In one of the cities, all inhabitants suffer from tooth decay and bad breath, while in another full citizenship is granted only to those with a stomach size above a certain minimum. In yet another town, each man owns a special rope with rings spaced at intervals, leading from the marketplace to his home, to help find his way back after parties; sometimes these ropes get tangled, with all the complications that entail.
Invited to make a work for HOUSING - a case study curated by Remco Torenbosch, a half mile of string may set the potential of the imagination in motion, inciting possible action. The work references the utopia and dystopia of modernity - often perceived as unfulfilled - which can result in great social discontent and disillusionment.
The work raises questions about the notion of an ideal society and about ways of living and coexisting, pointing to our choices regarding what to possess, initiate or reject.
What invisible lines divide and fragment society leading to uneven distribution of collective values?
Is it possible to create shared spaces, as originally intended by the architect of the Rotterdam social housing complex Justus van Effen complex? Or does it remain a different world and yet the same? A half mile of string claims potential space for further thought and action.
For the title of this work, a half mile of string we take inspiration from First Papers of Surrealism(1942), organised by Andre Breton, with installation design by Marcel Duchamp. Using a mile of rope, he had effectively made the exhibits impossible to see, arguing that this makes you aware of exactly what you are looking at.
What happens if we pick up the rope, change its direction, follow the strings to see where we end up? Seeing is a physical experience, made possible by the body’s involvement, possibly with other bodies. With Duchamp, we ask ourselves what and how we see, in what way and with whom, and whether and how art institutions themselves are implicated in both the subjects and the processes of our seeing and feeling.
