#breadprojects

Bread project, Špela Volčič 30301/140204

380 x 120 cm installation, variable dimensions, 100 pieces of bread

2013/14

Each of these sculptures arises from an experiment, the result of the leavening of a chemical reaction between the various ingredients, independent from my act. The result has been ranked in a consecutive order including year, month and quantity of bread created in that month. In the title are the two extremes, the first sculpture and the one that, at the moment, is the last. 

In an exercise similar to that of a geologist, who organizes based on form, the sculptures are divided into three categories. The “plain” bread is the result of a more substantial mass and density, almost without leavening. In the breads with the crust “cracked” the leavening process has been activated several times, often interrupted to allow a later editing. The “shells” are the result of a leavening process with a quantity of sourdough higher than normal.

Basically the idea was to replicate the photographic process into the sculptural one: as much the photographic camera as the bread machine, they are physical locations where a reaction takes place which is opposed to the control. As in photography the eye performs a selection, so I choose the ingredients and the type of dough. The impression, development and fixation become the leavening and the freezing of the form. In both cases, it is crucial mediation between their will and the unpredictability of the device.Interference is implemented in this way: emptied of its meaning the machine becomes useless, what comes out is not an edible product, but an experiment. If freedom means playing against the machine, perhaps, in a world that is mechanically distorted the function is the only freedom we have left.

Vilém Flusser, Towards a Philosophy of Photography