Alpha | Omega

2012

Video installation of two 16 mm films transfered to DVD:

Stan Brakhage, Window Water Baby Moving, 1959, 12’13’’

Stan Brakhage, The Act of Seeing With One´s Own Eyes, 1971, 31’50’’

2 video projectors, 2 DVD players, loop, no sound

Alpha | Omega, a one day only exhibition by João Leonardo consists of the presentation - in double projection - of two films by Stan Brakhage, filmed in 1959 and 1971. This show could be seen as another simple act of appropriation. But the truth is that it is imperative to revisit two works that are about life and death, and thus so deeply human. It is imperative to remember and understand what we are; a body with consciousness, feelings, emotions, rationality and the ability to act and to intervene in the brief space-time in which we exist.

In 2006 Leonardo exhibited a drawing-triptych entitled “List of Verbs” in the same location. This work - a handwritten copy of all verbs, i.e. all actions, we can do while we are alive (from: to create or to destroy, to think, to choose, to decide, to act, to react, to love.) - can be seen as a complement to this micro-one-man show and tribute to Stan Brakhage, a true visionary artist.