Casela

All that is actually happening in Angelika Markul’s installation, Casela, is taking place off camera. As in the case of other works by the artist, the projection is taking place in the company of an object. The object does not, however, dissolve the doubts which arise when watching the film, nor does it include any indications as to whatever it is that evades visualization and verbalization so very effectively. When entering the space of Markul’s installation, one cannot avoid the feeling that the actual setting of the events taking place in her works is in fact the viewer, with all his/her emotions, imagination and the individual archive of images and associations.

The two-channel video focuses on an animal: in the first picture we see the top part of its head with flies flying around it, in the second we see its muzzle, chewing grass. In both cases, one feels absolute calmness, which, in the works of Markul, is almost ominous. The animal seems to see more than we and to sense what is about to happen. All that we are trying to deny and remove from the train of thought comes back at us with extraordinary force. The flies clustering on the animal evoke associations with a carrion and portend the unavoidable extermination. The animal, easily recognizable in the world of moving pictures, loses its integrity in the parallel world of things. The stuffed fur “impaled” on a thin board has no shape and is devoid of any traits that could help identify it.

Evil lurks in the layers of Markul’s work hiding behind the picture and the object. Its presence is emphasized by the cold neon light, whose meaning here is symbolic. It is we who have to give the evil a face. We are automatically tempted to look for it in nature and its principles on the one hand and, on the other, in the relations between nature and culture, the animal and the human being. The taming efforts of culture have been here for centuries – in palace menageries or public zoos. Casela happens to be a name of one of the nature reserves in Mauritius. In the works of Markul, evil is not materialized; the fear foreshadowing the evil adopts a real form: both the fear that we suspect is felt by the filmed animal as well as the fear we feel ourselves.

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