prometheus rides again · 2007
plan_a · plan_b · plan_c
cardboard packaging, gallery cardboard, branch · black laid paper, photographs, xerography, nitro-pigment-prints, ≈ 150×85×72 cm
cardboard packaging, gallery cardboard, branch · black laid paper, photographs, xerography, nitro-pigment-prints, ≈ 150×85×72 cm
The work takes the form of a table-like sculpture whose physical equilibrium operates at the threshold of improbability. The structure rests asymmetrically: one side is supported by a block-like stack of folded cardboard boxes whose layered arrangement evokes tectonic formations or rugged landscapes. The opposite side is held by a slender branch. Spanning these supports is a gallery transport box lined with deep black handmade paper—a provisional surface that functions simultaneously as a fragile „tabula rasa“ and a field of action. Oscillating between workbench, altar, display, and conceptual space, this hybrid object becomes a site of temporary manifestation without any claim to permanence.
Positioned across this surface are „plan_a“, „plan_b“, and „plan_c“—dense constellations of silver gelatin prints, oil pastel, xerographic reproductions, and nitro-pigment prints. Together they produce a temporal paradox, oscillating between projections of a future yet to unfold and the remnants of a future that never came to pass. By resisting definitive resolution, the plans preserve a state of potentiality. They capture the liminal moment in which thought precedes action and the idea remains possibility.
The title recontextualizes the mythological figure of Prometheus. His return unfolds beyond the heroic narrative, emerging instead through the persistent, almost Sisyphean act of planning—the tireless attempt to establish structure and coherence even though the possibility of collapse is already embedded within the construction.
The installation evokes a subtle melancholy in the tension between visionary aspiration and material disintegration. Through its deliberate use of cardboard, wood, and paper, the work retains the vulnerability of the everyday. It resists the monumental; its elements remain provisional, open to intervention, and marked by the anticipation of their own disappearance. Rather than celebrating artistic creation as triumph, „Prometheus Rides Again“ reflects on the resilience of conceptual thought—the profoundly human impulse to imagine, construct, and begin again in the face of inevitable fragility.