Nel Verbeke
The mirror | hourglass, 2014 - 2016
glass, silver mirror, copper, ashed ash wood, sand
120 x 68 x 20 cm
8 + 2 AP
Mounted on the wall, a fragile instrument reflects its surroundings, slightly obscured. It is as if the mirror is itself asking for time to gradually process what is in front of it. It seems to question us on the transience of our being. In an equally hesitating way, the circumambient light is scattered through speckles, fragmented and nearly unreal. Attached to the round mirror is an elongated glass tube, partly filled with black sand. When the instrument is turned around, the sand slowly travels to the other side, seemingly unaware of the standardized units of time.
Its presence delicately merges two archetypical materializations of the melancholic act: a mirror, for self-contemplation, and an hourglass, rescaling the experience of time and duration. Its appearance evokes associations with ancient apparatus, instruments for an unspecified ritual. This association is further enhanced by its indications of decay, the poetic marks of an unspecified past, reminding us of our own, constant transformation.
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