Škuc Gallery 16 December 1999 - 30 January 2000

The ...incommensurabilis... exhibition is an initiative by Vadim Fiškin and is curated by Gregor Podnar. Four internationally well-known artists are taking part in this thematic group exhibition: Olafur Eliasson (Berlin, Copenhagen), Vadim Fiškin (Ljubljana, Moscow), Marko Peljhan (Ljubljana) and Eulalia Valldosera (Barcelona). The entire idea for the ...incommensurabilis... project is to present art work based on "immaterial nature" - light, shadow, fire, fog, water, electronic media, and alike. In the 1870s, Ludwig Bolzman showed that the application of the laws of statistical mechanics and the theory of probability to the movement of atoms could explain the second law of thermodynamics, which deals with the flow of energy. Particular properties of the atom (e.g. mass, charge and structure) define visual properties of substances (e.g. viscosity, thermal conductance and diffusion). Milk and tea easily mix into a brownish liquid; to separate them anew, or bring them into original states, however, one has to be inventive, one needs energy and special apparatuses. Thus the meaning of time also changes, for the irreversibility of certain "natural" phenomena points to the relativity (asymmetry) of time in a given context (space). Similar phenomena and principles, such as the immeasurability of specific contents (ingredients), or the impossibility of returning to the original state, have also been exposed as characteristics of the "ephemeral" works by the participating artists.

The project was financially supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia, Department of Culture of the City of Ljubljana, Danish Contemporary Art Foundation, Ministerio de Exteriores - Dirección General de Relaciones Culturales y Científicas, Espańa (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Spain), SCCA-Ljubljana, and APEXchanges. The project was sponsored by ARCADIA Lightwear, Ljubljana. Our gratitude goes to Cankarjev Dom, Ljubljana, and neugerriemschneider, Berlin.