The Rise and Fall of a Quantum Brat
Lumir Hladik at Nevan Contempo, Prague / April -July 2022 / curator. Pavel Svec
All my life, I hear that science has triumphed. Since I was 10 years old, I was told that humanity is very close to a full understanding of the laws of nature. Yet, 120 years elapsed since the discovery of quantum mechanics, 70 years since we heard about quantum biology and 30 years since we got introduced to quantum consciousness. Let’s admit, the full understanding of existence is and, forever will be an evasive horizon.
As a child, I fell in love with marionette theaters and my biggest wish was to see what the marionettes are doing when not on stage. Conversely, I wanted to know what is the world up to, when I am not physically present – when I’m not THERE.
I also realized that the real world is not any different from the marionette one, filled with obstinately interlocked and dovetailed backdrops and curtains: contexts in ranks – one after another, ad infinitum. And, I wanted to see beyond these contexts. I wanted to peek into areas I am routinely not able to grasp, areas that are unattainable by most. How does the triangular space underneath a carpet corner feel, when I’m away? A little later, it dawned on me… I’m a puppet myself. I have no control over my doing, over my own thoughts, over the flow of existence. Hence my burning desire to influence the flow of things and time, to flip “fractal switches”. And, first and foremost, to find any. On an occasion, I may still intrude into the MATRIX ever so imperceptibly and drag some of those ephemeral switches, at least those on the edge of the edge, for a short moment, out of darkness.
The Installation
My work has always revolved around four interdependent themes: mortality, determinism, the arbitrary nature of our very existence, and human irrationality. My newest installation, along an adjacent path, explores how foolish we are when trying to use our “superior” brainpower to defend our own (also superior) irrationality. More than an exhibition, my project is connecting “entangled” historical legacies and lessons learned or not learned. Reflecting on unpredictable historical syntaxes, I am negotiating an internal labyrinth, drowning in layers and vulnerable perspectives. The installation is taking place in an entirely repainted gallery, where collisions of esthetic and time horizons are occurring. Peach, skin and pink Barbie’s colours are forming the mood setting for three key artworks of the exhibit.
Time collider – revived vintage clock the sounds of which are being altered the same way as our memory changes, suppresses, consciously or subconsciously deforms the truth and disintegrate our collective memory of the truth. On another level, via its new transformation – the clock has now absorbed additional associative layers… it is a birdhouse, an old castle, as well as a doll house, a TOY. All the handwork and old wood legacy has been irrevocably supressed, muzzled and snuffed out. Yet, the clock’s own history and its cultural legacy, like a silent distant hum is still emanating from underneath its new, happy, sugar-coated veneer.
Proto-truth emitter – Centre piece of the installation consists of a duplex of partially teared-up cardboard “bio-intervention” tubes. These are created via a bio-symbiotic collaborative process that incorporates destructive marks of wild black bears and other Canadian wildlife. Again, a silent distant hum of scientific progress emanating from underneath its toy-like veneer. On another level, the entire assembly resembles a F-18 jet-engine testing rig or two corpses ready to be cremated in a tribal-style ritual…
Truth duality deceiving receiver – A large protruding shelf featuring a stereo
image of a marionette clown’s face with a “Pinocchio style nose”. The clown image is a screen capture of my Action art film titled: Ritual Murder of a stupid Smirk” (1976).
Lumír Hladík is a post WWII neo-Avant-Garde artist, a pioneering figure of the 70s East European conceptual and performance art movement. Fascinated by its immediacy and formal freedom, he engaged in action art, installations and interventions, along with similar-minded artists such as Karel Miler, Petr Štembera, Jan Mlčoch and Jiří Kovanda. He has adopted a very distinctive form of body art, described by art historian Pavlína Morganová as arranging “derailed situations”, documenting his art in photography and 8mm film. His early work explored the notions of alterity, mortality and determinism. After moving to Canada in 1982, the artist spent over three decades studying natural entropy in the Canadian wilderness. His art, an eclectic mix of retro-curia, baroque exuberance and sleek urban glitz-kitsch exploits a wide spectrum of disciplines such as drawings, mixed media, vintage ready-mades, performance art, video, photography, installations and interventions. Hladík’s bio-interventions, an inter-species collaborative work that incorporates destructive marks of wild black bears and other Canadian wildlife, are exploring notions of historical and cultural amnesia.
By the means of cross-pollination of a wide range of contentious sources; quantum physics, biology, pop culture, history, philosophy or religion, Hladík is synthesizing a frenzied alchemy of multilayered innuendos, riddled with ambiguity and myriads of subtle, yet perturbing references. He claims that his art responds to today’s society’s ubiquitously ridiculous “rational” defence of its own irrationality. Due to political circumstances in former Czechoslovakia and his relocation to Canada, Hladík has not appeared on the international art radar until around 2008. His early action/performance art has been discovered in 2010 and a comprehensive monography published in 2011. Consequently, his art has been acquired by prominent art museums and art institutions in the Czech Republic, including the National Gallery in Prague (2012), the National Film Archive, CZ (2019) and Gallery of Modern Art in Hradec Kralove (2021). The genuine strength and originality of his work also attracted institutions, galleries and collectors in other countries – Austria, Germany, Holland, Romania and USA. In 2020, his work has been acquired by the National Gallery of Canada.
Lumír Hladík / Pavel Švec
