Steffen Bunte‘s solo exhibition Shell; Fiction (Trailer) at Brussels’ Jean Rochdard, ran from October 29 to December 5, 2015. Pared-down and minimal, the installation appropriates automative elements and fragments of urban life into a poetic narrative connected to movement and stasis.
In an interview, Bunte notes that the title of the exhibition conjures up associations with a movie plot. In addition, a narrative sound piece written and read by the artist (which was also used as the press release) creates a background ambience within the space:
I’m trapped in inactivity. Resting makes me look absurd.
There is this dynamic potential,
the idea of being placeless.
A state, which is not determined by the present, but by a possible future.
I can’t be in two places at once – motion is most to desire.
I should interrupt.
I need to get away – off road.
No familiar places, no connection.
If you are dead, you can’t play dead. When one is dead, one is somewhere.
The narrative could either be from the perspective of an internal monologue or an anthropomorphised car that implies resting and a lack of motion. Inspired by design and display formats, vinyl foil and aluminum ‘pictures’ are hung on the adjacent walls. A large wooden stage occupies the majority of the room, and an assemblage of car parts, spray paint, foam and a duvet titled ‘Roadmovie’ (2015) sits by itself in the corner; limp. From one angle, a body looks as like it is wrapped under the blanket, and from another, a broken car part hangs out. The objects in the room are vulnerable and exposed and the exhibition remains in limbo between the bodily and the inanimate.**
Exhibition photos, top right.
