Part of the puntWG Open Call Series

Bernke Klein Zandvoort is interested in the paramateriality of the gaze. Our gaze belongs to us like a limb does, but when we try to touch it, our hand moves right through – like a magician showing there is no magic involved before starting the trick.  

Although technically our eyes work more like the insensitive sensors of cameras that cannot hold anything, the exhibition Eye as an Oracle presents the gaze as a projector. Klein Zandvoort takes the ancient belief that sight consisted out of rays from our eyes as a speculative for thinking about image, sight and virtuality.

In her fragmented video installation multiple narratives are woven together. A neuroscientific research group explores how predictions facilitate perception, a blind sculptor reproduces her mirror image by touch, a prosthetic eye is being handmade in a lab, and a woman sees phantom images after one of her eyes had to be removed. 

In these various narratives the scientific, speculative and poetic get entwined. In the undercurrent, Klein Zandvoort wonders to what extent we live in a continuous forecast of the future and whether we can regard our perception as a virtual process.

Events

Seeing without sight
Sunday 15th of October 11:30-13:30

What is sight and what could sight be without using your eyes? How do we move when we are not seen? How can we see another person without looking? In this gathering in the dark, guided by a blind and a seeing person, we explore in what other ways sight can be understood.

Mei-Lan Ng is a consciousness coach, artist, surfer, blind and limitlessly curious. She is fascinated by and trained in looking beyond the visible.

Alexandra Jaqcuet creates performative encounters and sensory installations, in which intimacy is explored in many facets.

Max. 10 participants

RSVP via bernke.begint@gmail.com

Artist talk and reading programme
Friday 20th of October 19:30-20:30
(information to follow soon)