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David Claerbout

Situated somewhere between photography and cinema, the work of the Belgian artist David Claerbout (b. 1969, Kortrijk) investigates the characteristics of the two related media as well as their relation to time. Projected on the wall of a dark room, the work Untitled (Man under Arches), 2000 at first appears to be a still image of a shady double arcade of an industrial form of architecture. It is only on entering the room that the viewer glimpses a character, apparently hidden in the shadow of the arcades, who appears furtively in the light before quickly disappearing behind the building. For a brief moment, the still image becomes an animated sequence. In this interactive piece, in which the frozen time of the photograph reveals the sustained parenthesis of a double cinematic movement, Claerbout plays with the perceptional expectations of the viewer when confronted with a strangely moving photograph.

Artworks

  1. David Claerbout Untitled (Man under Arches), 2000

    Interactive video installation
    Black & white, quiet
    300 x 400 cm
    Collection Mudam Luxembourg
    Acquisition 2006
    © Photo: Mudam Luxembourg

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