Reflecting on the culture I’ve been exposed to recently, a common theme emerges. A common theme, or maybe even something like a school of contemporary thought, which allows for connections between past, present, and future. A school of thought which, even though it’s unifying by nature, refuses to dictate an aesthetic approach and respects the contexts it is applied in. It can be an outlook on life, an artistic practice, and a curatorial strategy alike. In Amsterdam’s Tropenmuseum, the summer exhibition bore the title Healing Power, in London’s Somerset House Eternally Yours: Repair, Care & Healing, and at Gropius Bau in Berlin a group show of contemporary artists opened in September 2022 titled YOYI! Care, Repair, Heal. These are presentations, which aspire to respect the inherent qualities of the diverse artworks they assemble, while also making connections between them. In Healing Power, Marina Abramović’s “Shoes for Departure” and materials used by ritual specialists of the Palo Monte, an Afro-Caribbean religion with strong roots in the Democratic Republic of Congo, come together in the same room, speaking to a shared belief system. In her artist statement, Marina Abramović describes the shoes as a tool for a “mental departure.”
The 2022 Berlin Biennial was curated by Algerian-French artist Kader Attia, whose own practice and research revolves around matters of repair and reparation. Case in point is his influential multi-media installation “The Repair: From Occidental to Extra-Occidental Cultures”, which was shown at Documenta 13 in Kassel in 2012, consisting of photographs of horribly mutilated, reconstructed faces of survivors of the First World War, as well as artifacts like totems, sculptures, or tools from different cultures of the former colonies in Africa that had undergone processes of makeshift repair. Pertinent to this, taste-making actors in contemporary fashion seem to be more aware than ever about their ecological impact, pursuing strategies of upcycling and repurposing for haute couture and prêt-à-porter pieces alike. In architecture, the illustrious Pritzker Prize was awarded to Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal, who reexamine sustainability in their reverence for pre-existing structures, conceiving projects by taking inventory of what already exists.
Amsterdam-based artist duo Children of the Light position themselves in close proximity to the practice of repair with their new stage design for the band Darkside, consisting of Nicolás Jaar [see zweikommasieben #21] and multi-instrumentalist Dave Harrington. Though it’s a new stage design, the proposal has its roots in something that’s been done before: for Darkside’s 2013/2014 world tour, comprising over 100 concerts across Europe, USA, Australia, and Japan, Children of the Light came up with a light installation and stage design titled “Mirror Moon”, which comprised a large two-sided mirror onto which a complex choreography of light forms was beamed and reflected by analog slide projectors and two HD video projectors. “Mirror Moon” was a seminal work in the recent history of concert scenography—elevating the practice into the realms of high art. During the final concert of the tour, at Brooklyn Masonic Temple, Dave Harrington smashed the installation with a guitar, resulting in an iconic image that became part of rock history. And even though the act was spontaneous, its timing was cosmic: in 2014, the USA were at the brink of the upcoming elections which resulted in the presidency of Donald Trump. The shattered mirror was an expressive image of something grand broken into pieces. A beautiful image left to be re-discovered and re-built, to repeat the cycle of nature.
Almost ten years later, in September 2022, Darkside played a show at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery and Children of the Light once again provided the scenography, using the broken mirror as a jumping-off point for an actualized itineration of the stage design, now titled “New Moon”. Over the course of the concert, the fragmented mirror, which could be read as a metaphor for the state of the world in crisis, was reassembled. A simple approach with complex implications. The principle of repair requires the consideration of temporality. It presupposes a state of alleged unity or perfection which preceded the defect. But the notion of repair proposed by “New Moon” does not necessarily suggest the desire for a return to such a state of perfection. It alludes to the state in-between, to a laborious rearrangement (which in fact is executed manually by the artist duo on stage). Working in the shadows, wearing mirrored masks and black clothes, Children of the Light cite the practice of Kuroko, which describes the stagehands in traditional Japanese theatre that cautiously negate an idealized state of origin. Instead of aspiring to turn back the clocks to a time before the mirror was shattered, Children of the Light propose a creative re-appropriation by generating a new object of hybridity. On this theme, another Japanese practice comes to mind, that of Kintsugi. As a philosophy, it treats breakage and repair as part of the history of an object, rather than something to disguise. Instead of lacquer mixed with powdered gold, though, the broken mirror pieces are rearranged with the help of light, highlighting the gaps as spaces of possibility. By performing this act on stage, Children of the Light bring the technique of Kintsugi into the realms of performance art. As in previous works, light is treated by the artist duo as tactile matter. Instead of merely illuminating the surroundings, the light becomes a concrete presence that transcends its immaterial state. And like all the duo’s works, “New Moon” is in a constant state of flux. Affected not only by the light that shines upon it, but also by the mechanics of movement, the scenography possesses a shape-shifting quality that’s further elevated by the materials chosen: no two people look in a mirror the same way, every reflection is a new situation.
While in 2013 the object on stage was all mirrors, the second time around there was a literal dark side of the moon. A double entendre, with the namesake band performing in front of its manifestation as a symbol. The signifier before the signified. It’s only fitting, then, that the other two artists on stage provide balance by bringing the light, literally and figuratively; by guiding and arranging it, Children of the Light make use of its wondrous qualities to tell their story of repair. One that’s defined by its commitment to the process and that doesn’t shy away from showing it. It’s all there for everyone to see: the mirror, the light, the manual labor. The effort it requires to bring the pieces back together. “New Moon” indicates that the practice of repair is not a means to an end, but a meaningful act in itself. A meaningful act of reconfiguration. By laying bare the process, and the beauty that can come from it, Children of the Light’s work is a hopeful proposal for how the world could be: not one monolith of a reflection, but the possibility of infinite points of view that together form a communal experience.
