CIPRIAN MURESAN
2013-01-28The central work of the exhibition, Shredded Masaccio Book, presents the shredded paper remains of a hand-drawn version of Ornella Casazza’s text on the Italian Renaissance painter Masaccio. Titled Masaccio: and the Brancacci Chapel and published by Scala/Riverside (1990), the Italian artist Masaccio died at the young age of 26, while Muresan’s pencil-drawn book likewise had a short life, remaining in tact only for the days that it took for the artist to complete its pages. Before deconstructing the book, Muresan documented its pages and converted them into the form of a video slideshow. Nonetheless, Muresan invites the individual who purchases the work to devote an extensive amount of his or her time to taping the paper fragments back together.
For the video piece Untitled, Muresan worked with two stage directors to simultaneously orchestrate two different performances on the same stage. The directors were given complete freedom in choosing the play they would stage, while both they and the participating actors remained unaware of what the other group would perform, until both parties got on stage. Through this forced overlap, Muresan generates a new text, but also creates moments of chaos and harmony, thereby extending the communicative boundaries of the two individual theatre pieces.
Opposite – Untitled (From the Story ‘Invisible Clerk’ by Ilf and Petrov), 2012
Exhibition runs through to February 10th, 2013
Wilkinson Gallery
50-58 Vyner Street
London
E2 9DQ
