In his exploration of the technological image, David Claerbout develops a unique practice at the intersection of experimental cinema, video installation, digital animation, and live streaming of information. It is our way of perceiving images that interests him most. His work seeks to reconfigure the distinction between vision, memory, and hallucination.
A large-scale exhibition of selected works by Claerbout, titled Five Hours, Fifty Days, Fifty Years, will open on October 18 at the Konschthal Esch. This exhibition will present an overview of the complexity of Claerbout's recent and earlier work, as well as his latest creation, The Woodcarver and the Forest, which the artist describes as an experience to be experienced rather than seen. It consists of a performative video installation functioning as a merciless deforestation machine disguised as a pleasant, meditative scene. Scheduled to last several years, the installation shows a forest surrounding the woodcarver's modernist villa gradually disappearing as trees are cut down to make wooden objects.
A book evoking the chapters, disciplines, techniques, and fields of knowledge mobilized by Claerbout in his practice will be published by König Books on the occasion of the exhibition. This work can serve as an interpretative key or as a glossary of the artist's work.