OPEN THE END
A solo show by Anton Stoianov
August 27 - September 27, 2021

part of the program of ORTSTERMIN 21 – Art Festival in Moabit and the Hansaviertel

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Open the End is a project by Anton Stoianov created especially for the Scope BLN art space, within Ortstermin 21.

On the one hand, his installation has the features of a site-specific project and on the other hand it corresponds directly to the concept of Reset.

This new work develops in new directions the work on Queens of the Fauns (2018) where the artist works with large curtains and prints on textiles.

Open the End transforms the exhibition space using a long, white, silk curtain. A system of cornices is used for its suspension. It is mounted on the walls and ceiling of the gallery.

It creates a complex composition of straight and curved lines, unexpected curves and corridors that defines the silhouette of the huge, white curtain. Paradoxically, the curves and folds of the fabric create both a feeling of lightness and massiveness. The structure of the silk looks both - translucent but also monolithic. The work has a definitely sculptural character which "going out on the street" (because of the large window of the exhibition space), and seeks its social interaction with passers-by on the street and the residents of the neighborhood. Entering the gallery, the viewer experiences even more the interactive nature of the work because he / she is challenged to discover the labyrinth of uneven corridors created by the curtain.

The conceptual essence of Open the End is largely hidden in the idea of interpreting a labyrinth.

With a diverse range of permutations, the labyrinth is a symbol that has been with humanity since the pre-historic era. It is one of the most important symbolic constructions of the civilization. As a symbol that evokes Carl Jung’s "collective unconscious" as we find the same symbol speaking to similar meaning, across different cultures and unrelated time periods. From the labyrinth of the Minotaur, through Zen Gardens in Japan and Dante's Hell, to postmodern culture in pieces such as: The Name of the Rose, Harry Potter, The Matrix or different video games.

In today's COVID-19 era, we are witnessing an intense return to concepts of labyrinth.

This is exactly what the Open the End installation deals with. Through it, Anton Stoianov asks questions about the beginning and end of a road filled with many unknowns, many turns and many unforeseen deviations. The shape of the work becomes a metaphor for our contemporary perception of civil society which functions in the current political, social and economic reality where the new reality of the global pandemic is added and all the ensuing questions about the present and the future.

In this sense, the installation corresponds directly to the issues in the concept of Ortstermin 21: “What can and should stay the same, what can and must go? What processes can return to their initial state, and what needs to be changed or adapted, both on a small and large scale? What can be reused?“

Anton Stoianov bases his work on a material that transmits and reflects light. The visual implication is optimistic and positive - like today's society's hopes that the ‘opening of the end’ will not be the opening of the Pandora's Box but it will be a kind of Reset of a system that could obviously be improved by constructive and critical thinking.

 

Text: Boris Kostadinov

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