Research images
Flame and fire tests
Infrared thermal imaging tests
Text-based posters
Constantina Zavitsanos, video lecture made for and streamed at Edition IX – Bodies and Technologies (2022-23) Introductory Event, 2nd of July 2022, Likeminds, Amsterdam.
Curatorial note
A note I didn’t take (on artworks that completely disappear)
In a recent video call Constantina Zavitsanos told me something I wish I had written down. They said, “my ultimate goal (… or was it desire?) is to make an artwork that is completely invisible (… or was it an artwork that completely disappears?).”
I wish I could be more accurate with my words.
Some background
Two years ago, I invited Constantina Zavitsanos to develop a new project as one of our three Artist Commissions for If I Can’t Dance Edition IX: Bodies and Technologies. I had met Constantina in the context of the 2019/2020 COOP–study-group which I led and taught on behalf of If I Can’t Dance together with fellow teachers Arnisa Zeqo and Geo Wyeth at the DAI – Dutch Art Institute. That year we were researching the relationship between performance and tactics of invisibility, disappearance, and secrecy through the musical term sotto voce, a word that indicates a lowering of the vocal or musical instrument, and which literally means ‘below or under the voice.’ With this study group we were interested in decentering ocular-centric regimes of performance, questioning the complicated legacies of the gaze as a tool of objectification, measurement and otherization within colonial and ableist systems. In moving away from visibility, we wanted to make room for other organs and modes of perception, shifting from seeing to sensing, thinking about frequencies and whispers.
››› Read more
In a recent video call Constantina Zavitsanos told me something I wish I had written down. They said, “my ultimate goal (… or was it desire?) is to make an artwork that is completely invisible (… or was it an artwork that completely disappears?).”
I wish I could be more accurate with my words.
Some background
Two years ago, I invited Constantina Zavitsanos to develop a new project as one of our three Artist Commissions for If I Can’t Dance Edition IX: Bodies and Technologies. I had met Constantina in the context of the 2019/2020 COOP–study-group which I led and taught on behalf of If I Can’t Dance together with fellow teachers Arnisa Zeqo and Geo Wyeth at the DAI – Dutch Art Institute. That year we were researching the relationship between performance and tactics of invisibility, disappearance, and secrecy through the musical term sotto voce, a word that indicates a lowering of the vocal or musical instrument, and which literally means ‘below or under the voice.’ With this study group we were interested in decentering ocular-centric regimes of performance, questioning the complicated legacies of the gaze as a tool of objectification, measurement and otherization within colonial and ableist systems. In moving away from visibility, we wanted to make room for other organs and modes of perception, shifting from seeing to sensing, thinking about frequencies and whispers.
››› Read more