Jan Christensen
You might think that you understand, but there is a possibility that you do not get what it is and that it is not what you will come to think that you thought it was, 2007
Wall painting (text), transparent lacquer
Variable dimensions
The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Norway (2012)
Press release
The artwork consists of a sentence which has been painted on the wall with transparent lacquer. The lacquer is pigment-free material which only holds a vague yellow tone which is slightly visible at certain light conditions. The actual design is based on the artist's actual note for the idea itself, and intentionally not developed any further.
The visibility of the artwork depends on the situation of the lighting in the room, and changes dramatically with the influence of the outdoor light, appearing and disappearing with the change of day. Thus elements of text are only partly visible from different angles, depending on the light in general, forcing the audience to change the position in order to get an overview.
At first glance the sentence draws upon a kind of nonsensical poetry. Still, it's a statement describing the fundamental and basic principles at play when you approach a work of art; the combination of the sensory load and cerebral treatment of the situation. The curious mind treats data based on previously stored information and knowledge, plays with this matter and produces results which represent new interpretations or ideas. The logic of the mind is what constitutes the rhetorics involved in all forms of interaction.
The intention of the artwork in question is to challenge the viewer as it exists as an almost invisible piece of scribbled text, a statment that is so complex that it requires several readings and a fair share of mental processing in order to discern the meaning. The act of re-positioning yourself as you attempt to get an overview - the combination of the physical interaction and the conceptual treatment - also confuses the reading of the work. It is an evasive piece of text that tries to escape logic, but which also ends up circling it's own tail.
