RAZSTAVA IN PREDSTAVITEV KNJIGE, Fragments of time and place in photography
Najnovejša serija fotografij Barbare Jakše in Staneta Jeršiča nastaja v angažirani vizualizaciji sodobnih, z uniformnostjo globalizacije ožigosanih urbanih ambientov na različnih koncih sveta. S tenkočutnim prediranjem tančic zunanjega videza mestnega utripa se fotografa spuščata v zakulisje fragmentiranih okruškov življenja, ki jim vselej zoperstavljata izpraznjeno, skoraj sterilno izhodiščno podobo, nekakšno arhetipsko veduto prepoznavne mikrolokacije, v panoramskem posnetku razširjene v sugestivni, domala metaforični “psihološki portret” prostorov, neposeljenih s človekom, a z jasno čitljivimi sledovi njegove siceršnje prisotnosti. Natančni, visoko estetizirani črno-beli posnetki ne sledijo individualni identiteti izbranega okolja, ujeti skušajo vzdušje napetosti pričakovanja: navidezne oaze miru in posvojene, organizirane varnosti so tudi prizorišča nenehne latentne nevarnosti sodobnih urbanih spopadov.
V arhitekturnih okvirih Ljubljane, Dunaja, San Francisca, Münchna, Benetk in ožigosanega mesta Sarajeva skušata Jeršič in Jakšetova poudariti dihotomijo človekovega funkcioniranja v ambientih sodobnega sveta, v katerem se individualnost posameznika utaplja v splošno sprejetih kodih zapovedanega obnašanja množice. Na izjemno tenkočuten način opozarjata na svojevrstno krizo identitete urbanega, saj izpostavljata konflikt med arhitekturo oz. stavbami kot nosilkami lokalne prepoznavnosti, ter ljudmi, ki v naprezanju po aktualnem vživetju v zahteve časa in prostora prostodušno podlegajo vzorcem globalnih trendov. Kot da bi bil realni prostor ujetnik sedanjega trenutka, kot da ne bi bilo zgodovine, morda le še novica prejšnjega ali tega dneva, kot da bi vsaka individualna zgodovina izčrpala svoje motive in se znašla v nenehni izpraznjeni sedanjosti, prestreljeni s ponorelim hlastanjem za čim hitrejšo konzumacijo dobrin. Figure se zlivajo z okoljem, v njem izginevajo, se konformistično zapredajo v njegove nevidne niti in skupaj z njim oblikujejo iluzijo navidezne simbioze, diskretnega šarma miru v hipertrofiranem ritmu vsakdanjega življenja. Krhkost logike urejenega, nadzorovanega stanja stvari najbolj jasno razgalja prav fotografija, saj kot podoba ne obstaja v realnem, vzvrtinčenem in pospešenem dojemanju časa. Izrgana iz konteksta realnega časa, uklenjena v negibnost in tišino, veliko prepričljiveje kot vseprisotna, neulovljiva elektronska gibljiva slika označuje stereotip vsakodnevne reciklaže globaliziranih vzorcev bivanja v sodobnem svetu.
Življenje v večjih mestih s hitrim kopičenjem spreminjajočih se podob in oblikovanjem vedno novih javnih prostorov kot ključnih elementov urbanih strategij resnično ne prinaša stabilnosti, nasprotno, povzroča razdrobljenost in izgubo orientacije. Fotografske podobe so lahko zato fotografije česarkoli: podobe klišejsko prepoznavnih prostorov mestne identitete in podobe spregledanih, morda še bolj avtentičnih efemernih ambientov, ter kogarkoli: ljudi, ki so neznani drug drugemu, ki se zbirajo v skupine, vrste, mimoidoči, ki se srečujejo v trenutku, ki nima opraviti s preteklostjo.
Razen morda v Sarajevu. V mestu nepredstavljivega trpljenja, kolektivnega sovraštva, medsebojne solidarnosti, dvoumnega odpuščanja in globalne brezbrižnosti, v mestu brez vzora in vzorca, z avtentično in znova vzpostavljeno, v marsičem vsiljeno, ponarejeno identiteto, ter nepreglednim labirintom sveže izkopanih grobov. Ali je tukaj, v nedrih bodoče skupne, zaokrožene Evrope nastavljeno zrcalo resnične mentalitete lažnih prerokov Zahodnega sveta ter razgaljena demarkacijska linija Novega svetovnega reda in njegovega razsutega sistema vrednot?
Stane Jeršič in Barbara Jakše ne iščeta odgovorov in zaključene vizure sveta, saj se bržkone samo sprašujeta: Ali so sodobna urbana okolja v resnici prisiljena v proizvajanje potrošniške mentalitete kot edinega pragmatičnega cilja družbene strukture? Ali je vizualni red, kakršnega lovi njuna kamera, zgolj večno ponavljajoča se simulacija prostora v njegovi globalni, namišljeni razsežnosti nekakšnega umetno nadinvestiranega sveta, v katerem ni več prostora za lucidno misel posameznika in epifanijo podobe – ikone, ki navdihuje?
Marko Košan
The latest series of photographs by Barbara Jakše and Stane Jeršič takes shape in the conscious and committed visualization of contemporary urban environments in various parts of the world that have been “branded” by the uniformity of globalization. Sensitively piercing the veils of the external appearance of urban life, the photographers enter a behind-the-scenes space of fragmentary scraps of life against which they place an emptied, almost sterile initial image, a kind of archetypal view of a recognizable microlocation, expanded in a panoramic photograph into a suggestive, almost metaphorical “psychological” portrait of spaces unoccupied by human beings but with clearly legible traces of their presence. The precise, highly aestheticized black-and-white images do not follow the individual identity of the chosen environment; rather, they try to capture the atmosphere of the tension of expectation: apparent oases of peace and adopted, organized security are also the settings for the constant latent danger of contemporary urban conflicts.
Within the architectural frameworks of Ljubljana, Vienna, San Francisco, Munich, Venice and the stigmatized city of Sarajevo, Jeršič and Jakše try to emphasize the dichotomy of human functioning in the environments of the modern world, in which the individuality of the human being is drowned in generally accepted codes of the prescribed behavior of the crowd. In a very subtle way, they draw attention to the unique identity crisis of the urban, by exposing the conflict between architecture – or buildings – as the props of local recognizability, and the people who, in their efforts to accustom themselves to the demands of time and space, ingenuously succumb to the patterns of global trends. As though real space were a prisoner of the current moment, as though there were no history but perhaps only news from yesterday or today, as though every individual history had exhausted its motifs and found itself in an unending, empty present, shot through with a frenzied clutching at consumption, as rapid as possible. Figures blend with the environment, they disappear in it; they wrap themselves conformingly in its invisible threads and, bonded with it, form the illusion of apparent symbiosis, the discreet charm of peace in the hypertrophied rhythm of everyday life. The fragility of the logic of the ordered, controlled state of things is most clearly exposed by the photograph: as an image it does not exist in the real, vertiginous and sped-up conception of time. Torn from the context of real time, fettered in immobility and silence, it characterizes – far more convincingly than the omnipresent, elusive electronic moving image – the stereotype of the daily recycling of globalized patterns of living in the modern world.
Life in big cities, with the rapid accumulation of changing images and the constant formation of new public spaces as key elements of urban strategies, does not truly bring stability. Quite the opposite, it causes fragmentation and loss of orientation. Photographic images can therefore be photographs of anything: images of the cliched spaces of urban identity and images of overlooked, perhaps more authentic ephemeral environments; and of anyone: people who are strangers to each other, who gather in groups, queues, passers-by who encounter each other in a moment that has nothing to do with the past.
Except perhaps in Sarajevo. In a city of unimaginable suffering, collective hatred, mutual solidarity, doubtful forgiveness and global indifference, in a city without pattern or model, with an authentic and re-established identity, in many ways imposed and falsified, and a confused labyrinth of freshly dug graves. Or has a mirror of the true mentality of the false prophets of the Western world been set up here in the bosom of the future common, complete Europe, and the demarcation line of the New World Order and its fragmented system of values been laid bare?
Stane Jeršič and Barbara Jakše are not looking for answers and a final vision of the world. They are probably merely asking themselves: Are modern urban environments really forced into the production of a consumerist mentality as the only pragmatic goal of social structure? Is the visual order of the kind their camera is hunting merely an eternally repeating simulation of space in its global, imaginary dimension of a kind of artificially overinvested world, in which there is no more space for the lucid thought of the individual and the epiphany of the image/icon that inspires?
Marko Košan
Kaj: Fotografska razstava
Kdaj: pet, 2.9.
ob 18.00 do pon, 24.10.
Kje: Koroški pokrajinski muzej, Slovenj Gradec