The Exposition

Text
Kamil Nábělek

Exposition as a theme

The exhibition, entitled The Exposition, is a result of collaboration of Juraj Rattaj and Tomáš Roubal. Their installation is based on a specific architectural and spatial layout of the gallery, responds to it and transforms it into an almost theatrical scene, on which the exhibition takes place. Its theme is a meeting and merging of two disparate approaches: on the one hand, a minimalistic use of simple materials and components, on the other hand, exhibited objects emphasizing their handmade qualities and craftsmanship. Different phenomena and approaches come together in a dynamic tension of a consonant and dissonant composition, creating a hybrid metaphorical and ironically playful body. The approach of Juraj Rattaj and Tomáš Roubal is also conceptually informed - as well as the mass-produced object can be transformed by its exhibition in the context of the works of art into the thing endowed with the possibility of new interpretations, so the "exposition of the exhibition" can show techniques and processes of the exposition which remains more likely hidden, and also in the same way the thematisation of the concept of the exhibition can transform visually simple objects into wearers of an almost mysterious force.
Only one question remains, is this "exhibited exposition" an exhibition or rather a theatrical scene? Is it a model of an exhibition that will remain here in its museumlike dim light for a long time, maybe for years, or is it a dramaturgical exposition, after which there will be follow a collision, a peripeteia and ultimately a catastrophe?
Let it be as it may, the exhibition shows up that it is the exposition itself, the manner of presentation of the thing, what determines the possibilities of its manifestation and interpretations which we could not see without this show. And perhaps even more: a thing does not exist without its exposition.