TEXT OF EXHIBITION – HAY QUE CAMINAR …

AK2DERU – Hay que caminar …

I.

The iter mysticum, the idea of ​​an underground and salvific journey; the tremendum of the infernal deities, who reward the labors with gifts of immortality. The iter salutis, the experience of inner healing – conquest of an initiatory path among symbolic obstacles.

For this reason, we have Atac s.p.a. nowadays.

Substitute for the crossings of the spirit, as long as we never complain about the disruptions, that we do not curse the infinite delays, that we do not surrender to the disorder of nerves.

Ak2deru can figure this out. He tames Hades that daily impacts reality, harnesses it, gives it meaning.

So, let me tell you the first secret: the paper medium of the works on display is the Stygian offering which was made of metal in the past.

Ak2deru thus steals the profession from Charon, or perhaps aspires to become a new Hermes psychopomp. So that the offering, the useful means for crossing the infernal rivers of Rome – at least to free oneself from the persecutory fury of the Erinni in a green jacket – is here codified a second time, and thereby spiritualized.

The monosema here is ritual dance, swords, labyrinths, paths in the subconscious. Inner map of the trip; the anticipation of success. The world would be full of mystical experiences, especially in our western life. Speed ​​is a possible vector – among many of them – as well as when it is missing – the long wait for 44.

Walter Benjamin in the Parisian Passages has already observed the connection between métro, labyrinth, whole dimension and language. The names of the stations make “Napoleon I’s victories  turn into underground divinities ». The Parisian stations seem to Benjamin as strongholds of protohistoric suburre, « troglodytic kingdoms », conurbations of mythical forces, agglomerations of archaic sense. Language is a divine thing: you name and evoke, indeed raise. In this, art dominates.

I will tell you the second mystery of the exhibition some other time (why not feel like priests, hierophants, every now and then?) …

 

II.

Not even mystical journeys on buses have a real destination – if you are a customer even for only 200 times. It’s all one trip. « Hay que caminar … ». The stations are partial, as long as you are at stake. And if you intentionally qualify as a « wayfarer », located on a « path », be careful when you think  « I made it », some ticket inspector may persuade you otherwise.

The complete sentence sounds like this: Caminantes, No hay camino, hay que caminar, which can be roughly translated into « Wayfarers, there is no path, you have to walk ». Essentially, the experienced traveler proceeds as if there was no specific path/no marked road. And he experiments.

Legend has it that Luigi Nono – contemporary composer extremely dear to Ak2deru – found the writing in Toledo, a free interpretation of some verses by Antonio Machado, and that this inspired him a trilogy, between 1987 and 1989, of his latest works . No hay camino, hay que caminar Andrej Tarkovskij (1987), this is the title of the second composition of the trilogy.

Let’s mention the film Stalker (1979) in this regard.

With this quote Ak2deru tells us once again about his language system. Music is perhaps even earlier than painting, although not on principle. Prior to intentions, since it is akin to the material of thought. Ak2deru thinks musically. And thinking musically makes him think pictorial – only later. Ak2deru is a composer according to an aesthetic that unfolds from a knotted whole, where the composition is one, has a musical flavor, as a pictorial timbre can have. Adorno’s concept of convergence of painting and music as Scripture returns here.

The last reference falls to you, just like in a mystery triumph of late antiquity – the formal identification of the initiate with the divinity. If the ellipsis are dedicated from Luigi Nono to the great Russian filmmaker, consider yourself mentioned and involved, you,  travel procrastinator and equipped user of fully furnished areas.

 

Ruggero Barberi

(Critical text for ‘Hay que caminar…’ online solo show – March 2020)