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Victor Man // Untitled
victor20man200021

Victor Man Born (1974) and lives in Romania. Recent solo exhibitions: Galeria Plan B,Cluj, Romania (2005), Timothy Taylor Gallery, London (2006), Galleria d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Bergamo, Italy (2008); recent group exhibitions: Lehmann Maupin Gallery, New York (2007), Kunstverein Hamburg (2008), Romanian Pavilion, Venice Biennale (2007).

The installation Devoid Linear Narrative, Designed to be Understood Between… (2007) is a combination of sculpture and silk-screen photographs. The silk-screen prints, which were created from pictures taken during the 1980s, feature teenagers imitating rock band stars. The fur hat on the pedestal has been cut, like real hair, in the style of Duchamp’s famous star-shaped tonsure, which was shot by Man Ray. Victor Man brings together various types of souvenirs that amount to a kind of “period piece.” This installation thus constitutes a naïve yet intense reflection on delayed or underground information related to music and pop culture in 1980s Romania and Eastern Europe. The neon piece Untitled (2007) negates the certainty of our destiny. The short sentence “We die,” which is composed of vinyl letters, is crossed out by two X-shaped neon scribbles. The linguistic act of naming things allows them to vanquish their own end, while the cross embodies a floodlit refusal to accept the painful reality of our finiteness.