About this exhibition
Lacrimae rerum is a video triptych on the subject of a woman crying. Any visitor can freely appropriate the installation for him or herself, in private, with no time constraints or external supervision. The visitor is given the key to the exhibition room on request, in return for a deposit. This key can be handed back during WIELS opening hours, but may also be kept outside these hours (the room can be accessed independently from the street). Thus visitors can spend time in the room alone, or with their choice of visitors, as they wish; they can shut themselves away or allow free access to the room during their visit, and can arrange visits or return alone whenever they wish. One single key is issued per visit, so only one person has responsibility for access to the room at any one time.
The structure of the video triptych Lacrimae rerum (the tears of things) is realised through a very precise and structured découpage in 18 sequences ranging in length from 10 seconds to 2 minutes 20 seconds, each accompanied by one piano note (18 sequences associated with 18 different notes spaced at regular intervals, from the highest to the lowest tonality). Each screen is linked to a computer which plays each of the 18 sequences in a random order. The whole process on the three screens starts with the opening of the exhibition and continues uninterrupted 24 hours a day until the exhibition closes - a total of 610 hours. Thus during his visit each visitor sees only a fragment of a single long and unique film and sound sequence.
The installation is extended with 18 plates illustrating the composition of 18 selected moments from this installation, in the manner of a "musical score" of the whole piece.
What do this woman's tears mean: sadness, private grief, a call for help or an excess of anguish, liberation, joy, agape? What value, in the context of this installation, does our gaze accord these tears: pathos, obscenity, exhibitionism, voyeurism, empathy, universality?
The access to this piece and the viewing system itself question the very act of exhibiting in a public or private setting, the visitor's real access to contemplation, the relationship with control, power and freedom or the permission to look at and consider a work of art. This means of presentation more broadly questions the role, the position and the responsibility of the visitor in the context of an exhibition.