Jan Ale!
Vetrine exhibition at Art Au Centre #12 Liege, 2023
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This work is born out of an exploration into placeholder names and their translations across various countries. Starting from the assumption that all placeholder names represent the diverse identities of a single person, this artwork is an (impossible) attempt to integrate these identities, going beyond singularity and the boundaries of national states. By intertwining these diverse elements, the artwork seeks to evoke a sense of unity within diversity and provoke contemplation about the nature of universality.
Fragments of identity, belonging to each and none of us. Universal languages that hardly anyone can speak. Disjointed phrases purposefully vague. Disconnected symbols overlapped without purpose. Together, they unfurl onto the street, slowly revealing a familiarity that we all seem to have temporarily forgotten. Jan Ale !involves everyone, yet no one in particular.
It is a placeholder. But at what point does a placeholder become real ? (Parts of the work include fragments from “Verses of a Nameless Land” by Patricia Reed).