OTIS REM

Do playing cards ensure the way we hold them by their shape and function — or does the user define the rectangles of paper as playing cards by handling them as such? Pages of the book are turned with the same motion whether there is anything to be gained by it or not. Black, sleek, blank screen of a switched-off device shows smudges of fingers devoid of context as to what they were meant to achieve. Separated from objects that were their source, these abstracted gestures are grotesque yet poignant, irrational yet deliberate. Tactile exercises in reaching for the unseen, the subliminal essence of the object, the ghost in the machine. Switched off iPhone is like a spiritual séance – who moved the hand on the Ouija board?

laminated fibreboard, steel, plastic bags, analogue photoprint, acrylic paint, rubberized fabric, photocopy on paper, colour filters, found objects
(2017)

photography by Adam Šakový and Nika Kupyrova

resin casts are part of collaboration between Nika Kupyrova and Kristin Weissenberger

exhibition views at Tomas Umrian Contemporary