Media Art Net | Fietzek, Frank: Blackboard

Frank Fietzek «Blackboard» | The Blackboard

Frank Fietzek, «Blackboard», 1993
The Blackboard | © ;

In the work called 'Tafel' a small monitor that can move on rails is fitted in front of an old wall-blackboard with smudged traces of chalk still visible on it. The monitor is linked to a computer that can be seen under the school blackboard. If the monitor is moved along the blackboard, concepts and sequences of words appear on the screen and then disappear again. The words are written in chalk on a school blackboard. They are not linked to a particular monitor position, but appear randomly in different places. The concepts circle around themes like memory, recall, perception, and occasionally refer to a different meaning of the German word 'Tafel': the menu of the day in a restaurant ('Turkey steak Florida with rice and salad 14,-'). The work tells us about memory loss (the traces of chalk on the real blackboard can no longer be deciphered, but show that something is no longer there that used to be) and the way in which things can be stored in machine memory. The work also refers to the fact that remembering is hard work: a physical effort is needed to move the monitor and thus to make the information that has been stored visible. At the same time it is impossible to target a particular memory fragment specifically and call it up again. Memory is not 'indelibly stamped' into this model, but is constantly written over: Freud's 'miracle block' is evoked, the magic writing pad as a metaphor for the way memory works: only certain parts are retained in the process of writing and overwriting.

Categories: Installation | Text

Keywords: Interaction

Works by Frank Fietzek:

The Spatial Apparatus Subjective Machine

Frank Fietzek
«Blackboard»

A small, moveable monitor is mounted on tracks in front of an old school blackboard, on which chalk smudges can still be seen. The monitor is connected to a computer visible below the blackboard. If the monitor is moved along the board (it can be displaced horizontally and vertically), concepts and phrases written in chalk on a school blackboard flash on and off the screen. They are not connected to particular points in the monitor's movements, but appear arbitrarily, as if by chance. The words have to do with such themes as recollection, memory, perception, and they refer occasionally to other associations evoked by the word 'board', e.g. the menu in a restaurant ('turkey steak Florida with rice and salad 14,-').
The piece is on the one hand about loss of memory (the traces of chalk on the real blackboard can no longer be deciphered, yet they hint that something was once there that is now lost) and its transfer into machine storage. On the other hand it refers to the work involved in remembering. A physical effort is required to move the monitor, thus making the stored information visible. At the same time, though, it is impossible to bring out a particular fragment of memory on purpose. Memory is seen here not as an indelible imprint, but as being permanently written over. The work evokes Freud's 'magic pad', his metaphor for how memory functions, on which the process of writing and overwriting leaves only traces behind.