"I invented it all, in the hope it would console me, help me to go on, allow me to think of myself as somewhere on a road, moving, between a beginning and an end, gaining ground, losing ground, getting lost, but somehow in the long run making headway. All that is nothing but lies." - Samuel Beckett

Roundelay,[1] Rondinone's new installation at the Centre Pompidou, is a like a modernday split rendering of that same wandering. Like two sleepwalkers, a man and a woman walk within the architectonic labyrinth of the urban desert of Beaugrenelle, in Paris. As if driven by an interior force, their fragmented movements appear in sequence on six screens. The rhythm with which the images change reveal the characters to be pourvus de pieces manquantes (endowed with missing pieces – Samuel Beckett): a wide shot here, and there, followed by a close-up and then a medium shot. We see them face on, from the back, in profile, then catch a rapid glance at their shoes, from the back, from the front. We are familiar with Rondindone's way of telling a story through isolated snapshots, but this is the first time that the images come to life. The viewer becomes the scrupulous observer of a very personal work and, simultaneously, an eyewitness of the following statement, “In the domain of art as in life, of everything that happens in time […], we can, at best, possess it bit by bit, but never as a whole at any one time.” [2] That is how Samuel Beckett, being a great source of inspiration for Rondinone, summed up the aesthetic process he himself used for work he intended for cinema and television. With Rondinone, the motion of walking is shown to be psycho-aesthetic: a movement in which to find reassurance and restored strength, and also a way of escape, or an exercise in remembering or forgetting oneself. They could well be considered fortunate walking around with purpose but no goal. If that is the case, then Rondinone's “seekers” differ to the “figures lying down”: life-size clowns and artist's alter ego, all shown in a state of relaxation with their waiting and dreaming. These are considered today as “trade marks” of Rondinone's work. Focused on their own spirit and their own body as unique sources of awareness, they float in a sort of limbo, somewhere between time and space. They are frequently seated or lying down beside walls that shine with fragments of mirrored glass, or beneath the magical glare of hypnotic, coloured circles. In this relaxed position they can then embark on a journey within their interior universe, where we can imagine that they work on their self-awareness. That is the main aim expressed in Rondinone's work.” Through its repetitive form, Roundelay cuts its links with conventional, filmed narrative. But we, nevertheless, begin to sense the fragments of images, their rhythmic composition, like objets trouvés or found objects [3] rich with suggestion, which provide us with a point from which to begin inventing a story. We are actively encouraged to enter this sphere of imagination by watching the flux of images from the hexagonal space suffused with a strange orange light and whose materials are of unexpected softness (canvas, jute and felt), all of which combine to liberate our senses from the exterior world. Our normal perception is further disoriented by the ceiling, carpeted with woolly cobwebs. Finally, the impression gained is further emphasized by the enigmatic silence of the video (a silence made more profound by the minimalist and suggestive musical composition). Such are the foundations that help liberate the imagination, so that we can “hear the movement” and “see the sounds” [4]. Numerous aspects of Rondinone's work can therefore only properly be understood by actually looking at it. Ambiguous as it is, wavering between art and lyrical prose, his work as a whole undermines our ordinary expectations. The floatinoors symbolize this aesthetic of uncertainty. Rondinone's works are often permeated with an extraordinary atmosphere of uncertainty. They appear elusive and confused. Frequent changes of role, or personalities, as illustrated in the series of photographs I Don't Live Here Anymore (1995-2000), or in I Never Sleep (1998), evoke the theme of the double obscur, or dark, vampirish activities. In Moonlight and Aspirin (1997), sculptures of skeletal trees are placed in pairs or small groups and whisper excerpts of texts that once again remind us of that notion, so cherished by the Romantics, of the migration of souls or of animated life (beseelte Natur). Rondinone's viewers are often taken by surprise, like detectives groping for clues in a place unfamiliar to them, we trip over strange things in a strange world – over phenomena that we need to experience before even beginning to understand them. The romantic desire for that sixth sense, for a confrontation with the unknown, the intangible and changeable is one of the principal preoccupations throughout Rondinone's work. Could this be the reason for its magical attraction? Proust's assertion that “We love what we do not wholly possess […] [Love] only lasts if one part remains still to be conquered” [5] seems a reasonable explanation of the drive that animates Rondinone's figures in Roundelay. And maybe ours too?

Gaby Hartel

Translated by Diana Tamlyn

Excerpt from “Devoting oneself to an illusion…” in the booklet Ugo Rondinone: Roundelay, Editions Centre Pompidou, Paris, 2003.

[1] Roundelay is the title of a 13-line poem written by Samuel Beckett in 1976 (while expressing the idea of circularity, the word “roundelay”, literally “rondeau”, can be understood together with the word “delay”, as the action of turning around with no end result.)

[2] Samuel Beckett, Proust, translated and presented by Edith Fournier, Paris, Editions de Minuit, 1990, p.28.

[3] The text is in French.

[4] Sergei Eisenstein, “An Unexpected Juncture”, in Angela Moorjani, Carola Veit (ed.), Samuel Beckett Today / Samuel Beckett aujourd'hui, vol. 11 (Endlessness in the Year 2000/Fin sans fi n en l'an 2000), New York / Amsterdam, Rodopi, 2001, p. 328. 5. Samuel Beckett, Proust, op. cit., pp. 61-62.