Figures of Thought
Els Viaene, 2024
Concept and realisation: Els Viaene
Electronics and programming: Elias Heuninck
Object and mechanics: Koen Daems
Co-production by Werktank and STUK
“The ephemeral qualities of sound and smoke reveal to me a profound paradox of presence and absence, where nothing holds everything” – Els Viaene
This looking box captures a small part of reality to give shape to the nothing. It creates an intimate play between light, smoke and sound. Through the light, which itself is not visible, we can see ‘everything’. But when the smoke makes the light visible we can see there is nothing. A voice talks about presence and absence. The ephemeral smoke makes the sound visible. The voice gives shape to the unspoken. In the smoke we dissect the ways in which what is muffled and cloudy, visible and barely perceptible, can speak volumes. This box doesn’t hide anything, it makes the invisible visible. There is nothing inside but at the same time everything is there. Artist and spectator find eachother in absence. Here and now, there and then.
A figure of thought is a rhetorical device in language. Very broadly, it is a method of presenting ideas, feelings or concepts in an artful way. The method of presentation is different than what a person might consider “ordinary.” Also known as a topic of invention, a figure of thought usually makes some connections to a person’s sense of logic or emotions. It implies more than what is actually is said, forcing the listener or reader to draw on his own experience and culture for meaning.
