Robert Blake Suture

October 8 - November 5, 2009

Curated by Sam Samore

• Suture (2009) is an installation work that employs video, sound, lightboxes, color photographs, engraved mirrors, objects, and text. Implied by the title is the co-joining of parts sewn or fused together, asynchronous and sensuous. Surfaces with images, texts with objects, and projections with sounds contribute to a site that resonates. Crescent (2009), a curved sculptural wall with sound, will continue its life on the web post-exhibit.
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• Robert Blake (b. 1952) is a multi-media and performance artist, photographer, educator, and author. Mr. Blake directed The General Studies Program of the International Center of Photography, New York, 1985-2008. He was visiting artist at the Ecole Superièure Nationale de la Photographie, France, 2008, and curator of Affinities, Alignments, Collisions, 2008, 601ARTSPACE, New York. In 2005, the Rencontres d’ Arles commissioned his multi-media performance and projection work I am not a Photograph, presented in Arles, France. Mr. Blake is the recipient of an Etant Donnée grant for his solo exhibit, Legend, Paris, 2000. He is co-founder with Susan Jahoda of the performance art group Hybridaxe, active since 1992.

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• Sam Samore is a New York-based artist who works in video, photographs, texts, and installations. He is the author of numerous fables and stories.

A Story of Shadow and Doubt
by Sam Samore, Curator

A long time ago there was a neighbor sitting in the kitchen with a friend.

"Kindly bring my mirror, for I have fear,” said the neighbor.
"How can I navigate the emptiness?" replied the friend.

Then the friend set out beyond the known world, arriving upon a barren room with many sailors gathered around a bell.

"Why have you journeyed here?" asked a sailor.

"I am seeking the shadow,” said the friend.

"Hear where you stand," said the sailor.

"I do not imagine it,” positioned the Sun.

The Sun happened also to be the friend who had broken a taboo.
And the sailor as well was a metaphysician who reflected deeply in the space between the Sun’s repose, then suggested,

"I will offer you a place beyond your senses, but only if you turn around and promise to forget whatever your mind holds true.”

The friend responded in a labyrinth of quick and slow echoes, while the metaphysician administered an alchemical phrase. The Sun immediately, and quite possibly permanently, fell into a window of invisibility.

"Where is Shadow?" questioned a nomad through the looking glass, while observing the friend and sailor.

Sometime afterwards the nomad made a visit to the countryside, carrying along the Bird of Resonance in its cage,

Suddenly the bird queried,
"Will you set me free?”
“Unconditionally," replied the nomad without hesitation.
The friend traveled great distances and passing through an eternal singularity, came to a non-narrative clearing. In its center were inscribed long forgotten sensations, identified as several miraculoso's. Along with fragments of no return, the friend arranged for a set of indefinable memories to be shipped home.
The nomad carried both hands in a flower, summoning a book, a tincture of mercury, salt water, and a turtle. Once assembled, and quite matter-of-factly, the turtle became the image of the Sun.
The neighbor arrived at a courtyard filled with an immense assortment of individuals and was informed that the Sun had vanished. A bird had been set free. Rumors and conspiracies filled the air.
“Behold! I bring ambiguity," proclaimed the bird flying above.
“More risks will transpire," the bird vibrantly declared.

The nomad wandered in random circles of confusion, and eventually met a Siren, with whom a new language was exchanged. The nomad acquired the means to become unknowable.

Morning arrived. The friend and the sailor sat down to breakfast. When a covered dish was brought before them the sailor said,

"Lift the lid. Be careful – don't disturb the sleep of the shape beneath."

The friend stretched out a hand to raise the lid. Inside one could see a trail of tears, a verdant field of humor, and a view of the steel blue sea. On a limb that extended over the cliff, sat a raptor.

"The Bird of Delay has a riddle for us,” observed the friend.
“Yes, I recognize the Bird of Shadow,” replied the sailor.

The neighbor awakened, recounting all that had been seen and heard in the dream.

"So this is why you called out to me?" pondered the metaphysician, who went back to the breathing meditation.

Rising the following morning, the neighbor advised the friend to walk to the seashore and search for the dream's omen. Nearby an invisible eavesdropper recorded these thoughts. The friend eventually returned to the kitchen, locking the door with mirror in hand. Finding the bolted door, the nomad begged the friend to open up in the name of all that had ever happened, including everything that had been forgotten, remembered, and forgotten again. Then waited.

Next evening the raptor reappeared, bringing the Bird of Doubt, a cousin. For three days they repeated in unison and without cessation the question of the previous afternoon. It came to pass that every tree upon which the birds sat became transparent.

Shortly afterwards, walking in the grove of Sycamore trees, the sailor quizzed the neighbor,

"What more do you desire that I might let go of the tenderness which weighs heavily upon the Bird of Delight?"

The metaphysician re-imagined all that had been touched, said, seen, and lost since the incident of the birds and their question. Meanwhile all the trees stood in limbo. The neighbor signaled everyone to smear themselves with birdlime. The assembled crowd mumbled curses and antidotes. The Sun showered them with gusts of light and shadow.

Time passed, and the birds were nowhere to be found. They had disappeared. Friend, nomad, metaphysician, neighbor and all gathered realized that what they had seen before was now gone, invisible once more.

Everyone was searching about.