Lera Kelemen




  • corporeus thirsty

  • Backslit
    Deadlift
    Vessel
    Neverknee


Small Worksdrawings & boxes

  1. Crystal Box
  2. Campus Cinereus
  3. Tellus
  4. Apollo’s Wing
  5. Love Box
  6. Tank
  7. Diptyque
  8. Rose & Velum

Only so much adrift to brace my self control


2025

artist’s slip dress (absent) / metallic watch cases sourced from collectors, watch makers & English households (1930-2010) / archival glassine paper / wire / wood display structure



Dimensions, variable (object: 74 x 42 x 15 cm / display: 240 x 200 x 240)

—
A slip dress I wore nightly, impulsed to preserve it – its movement & permanence, its folds. First, I placed it in a bag, then froze it. Then let it sit on the table in my studio. Over the next two months, I gradually retraced the shape & volume. The process became systematic & intentional – a precision aimed at protecting the item precious & frail, that covered, revealed, made me feel seen, exposed, frail, fierce – through a multitude of gazes. Over 500 discarded metallic watch cases retrace that dynamic carelessness, the control & ecstasy.

—
Barthes would call this the punctum, that tiny wound where meaning is overexposed. The collectioneuse’s moment of tenderness, or perhaps of jealousy, towards her objects. Her self-induced sequestration-by-words. My sense of self, lost & preserved, you say, already ceased, and there’s no better illusion than the wristwatch.


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