THE CHARON CYCLE
COLLAB WITH TICK TACK BELGIUM
The Charon Cycle is a program of 4 video sessions - 1 per week - curated by Videodrome Paris for Cinema TICK TACK. Attuned to its core concept consisting in the alternative curation and diffusion of video art, Videodrome Paris, a platform devoted to the exploration of moving image-based experimentations, was invited to conceive a 4 weeks-long program specifically designed for Cinema TICK TACK, in consideration of its engagement for emerging art and its unique site settings.
Indeed, TICK TACK’s Window on the World - type of installation in his iconic brutalist building, has strongly inspired the Videodrome Team who imagined a narrative based on the antique reference of the Vitrine: the cabinet of a spirited collector who gathered art and science objets from all around the world, with the purpose to acquire knowledge about a device, satisfy his own curiosity or impress his visitors by a collection of apparat, expressing pompous splendour. The Charon Cycle questions what a contemporary video cabinet would look like through the prism of 4 selected key objects referring to the specificities of the medium. An easel, a gamepad , a diary and a hourglass, are alternatively placed in the lower window « the Vitrine », while in the upper window related- videos are projected through the white cube to the street. The passerby, as a modern visitor, is guided by these objects towards the selection of artworks and immersed in this international, multiform window: the video medium.
The Cycle takes its name from the antique Ferryman Charon, the mythological « carrier », bringing the souls to the other side.
Omnipresent from the origin of narration, the figure or the « Carrier » vector of messages and guide of men, is the archetype of the media as a conductive body, sign of communication, the circulation of information and diverse other exchanges. The first written reference to the use of this figure in the art is given by Alberti in his De Pictura, mentioning a character which presence acts as a warning to the viewers, inviting them to engage with the artwork. The same Alberti who described art as a « Window open on the world ».
For this cycle, the 4 objects play the part of the Carriers: Each have been carefully chosen as a reference to the video medium and a key opening a theorical framework for the interpretation of the films projected.
These 4 symbolic objets crystalize the essence of the medium, its background, its characteristics, its future and the numerous phenomenons at stake during a viewing experience. Not only they serve has catalysers directing the viewers’ interpretations, offering a base for their understanding of the video selection, but they also open a broader question on the origin of the medium and its ability to provide a support for sensitive experiences through a wide range of narratives. At the end, the body of the film itself, this complex medium encompassing time and space, is in its own the Carrier conveying sensitive messages beyond the narratives.
