2009-22
Wall Chair, 2009-2022
Modified wood-and-steel chair
Installation views from Artistic Ecologies: Every Day at Galerija Nova, Zagreb
Window Seat, 2022
Broken double-pane window, tape, chair
Installation views from Vlatka Horvat: By Hand, on Foot at PEER, London
Where a Body Might Rest, 2017
Chairs, corrugated cardboard, wooden sticks, metal rod, PVC pipe, tape
Installation views from Vlatka Horvat: Extensions at MSU – Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb
Floor Chair (I,II), 2009-10
Modified wood-and-steel chair
Installation views from Vlatka Horvat: Or Some Other Time at the Kitchen, NYC
The work consists of a simple school chair, cut in half and positioned flat on the ground, so that it seems as though the object has partially “disappeared” under the floor surface. While this situation presents a question of “where did the rest of the object go?”, it also invites the viewer to reflect on the space which is beyond our perception, and by extension, putting in question the very concreteness of the built space and the permanence of structures that contain and frame up things in our physical world. Arising from the desire to blur the clear-cut boundaries separating an object from a room, Floor Chair represents a kind of a merger of a chair and the floor, producing a new hybrid ‘object’ of sorts, one that’s half-chair and half-floor. The gesture appears to confuse the distinction between elements of architecture and physical objects, whilst also giving the severed chair a humanoid presence, appearing here as a kind of a surrogate for the body existing in a close physical connection to the space it inhabits.
Wall Chair with Moss, 2009
Modified wood-and-steel chair, moss
Installation views from Vlatka Horvat: By Bending Back at annex14, Bern
Wall Chair with Trees, 2011
Modified wood-and-steel chair, photograph face-mounted on Plexiglass
Mirror Chair, 2009
Modified wood-and-steel chair, mirror, modified wooden table top
Installation views from Vlatka Horvat: Or Some Other Time at the Kitchen, NYC
Mirror Chair consists of several objects which have been cut in half and positioned leaning against each other. A simple wooden chair has been cut in half and placed against several flat surfaces – a mirror and a severed tabletop – in such a way that it seems as though the chair had partially “disappeared” into a space “inside” the mirror. The reflection in the mirror of the half of the chair which is physically present in the room seems to “complete” the missing part of the object – creating a new kind of an object, a hybrid entity that is half solid matter, and half reflection – half physical reality and half illusion; half object and half image.
This simple optical illusion allows us to perceive the full chair, even tho what is physically present in front of us is only one half of it. At the same time, the apparent crudeness of this home-made magic asks us to ponder the question of ‘where is the rest of the object? – as we see its simulated completion, which stands in for the missing part. Additionally the piece opens up the question of, ‘what is that space beyond what we can see, or perceive, or experience’, ‘what is the space of reflection’ – of image, of our own likeness, or the objects – and our own – double.
In the encounter with the object, the viewer sees only the lower part of her body reflected in the mirror, as though the same kind of an operation of being cut in half has been virtually enacted on the viewer’s body. The body of the viewer and the body of the object (chair) have been severed and split in the same way – the viewer has to “complete” the missing picture of her severed body by imagining the rest of her reflection, the way the mirror completes the missing half of the chair.
