My contemporary

AdelAbdessemed

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adel_Abdessemed)

It is a difficult task to say what ‘My contemporary’ is, in part because one should have a whole philosophy concerning the interpretation of time,  lots of self-awareness and a vast knowledge in art. I am going to talk about  ‘My contemporary’ as one precise sensation I felt some five years ago, when in Turin (http://www.fsrr.org/?lang=en ) I saw the solo exhibition of Adel Abdessemed, and in particular the screening of ‘Don’t trust me’. From that sensation I’m going to try to develop some characteristics of 'My contemporary'.

‘Don’t trust me’

In this video a series of animals is being bludgeoned to death with a sledgehammer blow on the head. 

The view of this work paralyzed me. 

With some distance I can say that this was an aesthetical experience related to the most classical conception of sublime, or even delight

This sort of provocative ritual, barbaric for our western contemporary mind, linked past and present in a powerful, non-judgmental, understanding of life – of its fragility and value. 

Sometimes we think of art as a safe place, this is to me an example of how art can deal with courage, risk, the politically incorrect, and all sorts of contradictions and deep problematic of life. It is, of course, an extreme example. However, I found something necessary in this atrocious execution. I am under the impression that Abdessemed was dealing consciously with our most instinctive and original side and society’s moral constructions. How did our vision of life evolved? How do we respect and support forms of life? Our physical pain, the other’s? Justice. Fairness. Etc. 

When there’s a call to awareness concerning us as human being and members of societies, I feel there’s a call to contemporaneity. The emotions and the questions raised live in an unsorted stream of time: past, present and future display themselves simultaneously.  

‘My contemporary’ would then be that artist, or work of art, that manage to uproot my little self from a self-absorbed vision of existence.  ‘My contemporary’ pushes me to embrace all the shades, the most extreme and the most silent expressions of the “right now”; my contemporary empowers life.