Horos 2, 2008 Left: still from video, filmed and edited by the artist. Right: self-shot photography. Courtesy the artist and National Gallery of Contemporary Art in Opole.
Horos II, 2008
Ephemeral outdoor installation and interactive performance; self-shot and edited by the artist video and sound; online participatory project. Part of "KRAJ" at The Gallery of Contemporary Art in Opole, Poland, curated by Marek Bartelik and Madgalena Potorska, 21st May - 29th June, 2008
Monika Weiss' "Horos 2" (2008) is a site-specific outdoor performance and installation in which the artist continues her "Intervals" series-large-scale outdoor landscapes that others may enter and fill with their own actions and which often undergo dramatic weather changes. Spanning from many hours to several days in duration, these actions result in video pieces filmed by the artist from an aerial viewpoint, juxtaposing vertical and horizontal views to enable a feeling of flying and conversely, of falling and creating a two-dimensional graphic universe.
For the project in Opole Weiss invites local inhabitants to join her in complete silence and to lie down on the ground covered by white canvas sheets, drawing abstract outlines of their own presence with black lines around their silhouettes. A chronotopic meditation "Horos 2" investigates scripture and mark making as indicators of the fragility of our embodiment. Passersby, participants of the project, remain with the artist as long or as short as they want, making the drawing, or, simply, spending time inside image/drawing, taking place in their presence and with their participation. Suspended from the rooftop, a video camera transmits from the "bird's view" the image of what is happening in the space of drawing. This image is viewed on a monitor inside the gallery, which the participants can observe both during and after the performance. This way a journey begins, within both individual and communal space of drawing. The project will continue beyond the exhibition, both as the resulting video/sound piece and as an interactive work online, where future "passersby" may enter and leave abstract marks of their presence in a virtual realm.
