0036
16-05-1994
OPUS 4
Joris Wille
Artist
Joris Wille’s spatial manuscript can be read like a score: the autonomous components are brought together like the notes of musical instruments in a piece of music. Together, they determine the sound. The connection becomes clear due to the ordering of the visual elements, which are joined together in the same way that individual beads are strung on a thread to make a necklace. Like his installations, the manuscript can be viewed on all sides; there is no front, back or side, at most a beginning and an end, a movement through time. The objects are characteristic of his work; the use of silhouettes, light sources, clear areas of colour and sometimes (references to) sound.
In the images and their ordering, Wille harks back to his Indonesian ancestry by means of the metaphor of the Wajang, the shadow puppet play. On one side there is the visible reality of the gamalan (the orchestra) and the dalang (the puppet player). On the other side, a make-believe reality of silhouettes becomes visible. The viewer chooses on which side to sit. This accessibility breaches every spatial delimitation, as it were. ‘Opus 4’ is formulated as a manifesto, a representation of Wille’s work and working method in miniature.
