However, how to turn an object
into a full-fledged stage figure
that is ready to create a dramatic tension,
visualize the message,
and even
unleash feelings?
Of course, from the field of art
I was familiar with
kinetic sculptural forms,
but due to their “abstractness”
they did not meet
the above requirements.
I had to incorporate a message
into the operation of my machines.
Moreover,
for the sake of contrast, I intended to
construct them based on a canvas
with a high emotional charge.
Ideally, they would address
some theme that is deeply human,
and at the same time related
to routine activities
carried out with a cool head,
almost mechanically.
I have always been
very impressed
by glittering rows
of organ pipes,
hence I intended
to use their form
in one of my
future objects.
It happened
that while browsing
an album on the art of
Francisco Goya,
I suddenly noticed
their shiny array.
It was not, however, an organ,
but a string of aimed rifles
from the canvas
“The 3rd of May 1808.
The Execution of the Defenders of Madrid.”
This was exactly what I was looking for!
That’s how the idea for a new object came about:
a set of organ pipes,
which, when lowered to the horizontal position,
become rifle barrels,
augmented with flasks.
Against them I added
a metal frame
with a white shirt
hung by its sleeves
– the main accent of Goya’s painting.
Clad in it,
the executed character,
with his arms raised upwards,
constitutes a distinctive sign of
despair,
defiance,
scream.
I further enhanced
the drama of the action
by the fall of the shirt after the salvo
and the effect of bleeding.
This is due to
a drainpipe with some red liquid,
in which the shirt is immersed
– dripping,
while rising by itself.
This is how the
“Mobile of Perpetual Execution” came to shape,
and, even more importantly,
underlying issues were revealed,
constituting the essence
ready to “drive”
my idea of
MECHANICAL THEATER.
That means
shooting,
depicted here
as a dispassionate,
almost instinctive,
ceremonial of the infliction of capital punishment
– which is murder by order of the law.
And all this
in the name of justice
conceived in a particularistic way,
being a blatant violation of its ideas
– as it happened
in Madrid on May 3, 1808.
Showing the form of the pipes
(in the first part of the object)
found a direct reference
to the organ works of
Johann Sebastian Bach,
and further to fugue
– the most masterly
musical form,
whose peak development
was reached by the
the Leipzig cantor.
Therefore,
this is one of its examples
we hear at this point in the
stage presentation.
This is how the title emerged;
“LAST FUGUE,”
but also
a complementary dedication
– in tribute to Goya and Bach.
Hence,
the same
row of metal pipes
will first resound
with the spiritual splendor
of Johann Sebastian’s music,
to detonate a moment later
the cruelty of the crime
from the darkness of the Goya painting.
This is
the painful duality
of human nature.
A ready-made indictment.
