Theatrum Orbis Terrarum - Gestures, Bloomberg SPACE, London, UK

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Exhibition: COMMA 02
Material: Rear projection screen, list on the wall of all the categories
Location: Bloomberg SPACE, London, UK
Duration: 4 March 2009 - 21 march 2009
Curated by: Graham Gussin and Sacha Craddock
Text: Giving Directions by Richard Wentworth

Exhibition: The Order of Things
Material: Two rear projection screens, list on the wall of all the categories, publication (Gestures)
Location: MuHKA, Antwerp, BE
Duration: 11 September 2008 - 11 January 2009
Curated by: Dieter Roelstraete
Participating artists: Roy Arden, Sarah Charlesworth, Marjolijn Dijkman, Hans Eijkelboom, Daniel Faust, Douglas Huebler, Sanja Ivekovic, Luis Jacob, Cameron Jamie, Arthur Lipsett, Tine Melzer, Marc Nagtzaam, Cady Noland, Peter Piller, Sigmar Polke, Richard Prince, Robert Rauschenberg, ROMA Publications [Mark Manders & Roger Willems], Julian Rosefeldt, Thomas Ruff, Joachim Schmid, Steven Shearer, Nancy Spero, Batia Suter, Els Vanden Meersch, Christopher Williams and Jef Geys

"In some sense, The Order of Things views the world as a universe entirely made up out of images/pictures (mainly of a vernacular photographic nature) and only made accessible to us through images/pictures; a world that may seem impossibly chaotic, and therefore invites all kinds of ordering interventions that seek to domesticate and contain the natural excesses of the image-world. This partly ironic, self-conscious Will to Order – a classificatory impulse that is supremely aware of its own futility, and of the fatal contingency of its classificatory criteria – is the precise juncture where the archival and/or encyclopaedic impulse in contemporary art enters into the picture: the "art of classification" that is implied in the archive, the atlas and the encyclopaedia (or its corollaries, the data-base and image-bank) is an integral self-reflexive part of what Martin Heidegger has called "the fundamental event of the modern age" – the "conquest of the world as picture." - Dieter Roelstraete

Online representation:

The online publication gives the possibility to follow the process of the research besides public presentations in exhibitions and publications and will actively be brought up to date. www.theatrumorbisterrarum.com

Exhibited at:

2010
Making Do: Uses and Tactics, BKKC, Tilburg, NL

2009
Source Material, Tent. Rotterdam, NL / Comma 02, Bloomberg SPACE, London, UK / The Order of Things, MuHKA, Antwerp, BE / 7th Mercosul Biennial, Porto Alegre, BR

2008
Decollecting FRAC Nord Pas De Calais, Dunkerque, FR + De Garage, Mechelen, BE / Visibility Works, Barcsay Hall, LowFest, Budapest, HU / ORTung, Galerie 5020, Salzburg, AT

2007
Neue Konzepte, Bonner Kunstverein, Bonn, DE / Contemporary Passages, Tent. Rotterdam, NL

Theatrum Orbis Terrarum

Theatrum Orbis Terrarum is an ongoing worldwide investigation and an attempt to rethink existing representations of the world. Theatrum Orbis Terrarum presents traces and effects of human interventions in our surroundings. This work consists of an ever-expanding series of gestures photographed worldwide since 2005 and categorised in approx. 120 categories. The images can be taken anywhere; they all emphasise that people, regardless of their geographical location, have similar ways of organising and designing their daily environment. Examples of these gestures are found in the way that elements are adapted, concealed, censored, directed, demonstrated, mirrored, constructed, and so on.

The work is in a constant state of development and are extensively brought up to date when new images and categories have been obtained. One image can be included in different categories and systems and, in consequence of this, trigger opposite meanings. The projection of this work takes approx. 8 hours and consists of about 9000 images.

Theatrum Orbis Terrarum takes inspiration Ortelius' Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Theatre / Mirror of the World) is considered the first true atlas in the modern sense. It was published in 1570.

Publications:

www.theatrumorbisterrarum.com online publication, published by the Jan van Eyck Academy. (2008)



Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, 128 pages B&W (2007)


Texts:
Giving Directions, written by Richard Wentworth for the exhibition at Bloomberg SPACE
Mapping, Collecting and Archiving, Interview by Annette Schemmel