At the heart of the image there is a static, composite torso, which seemingly coincides with the rhythmically invigorating limbs of a dancer, his eyes closed, his head swinging like a puppet. In a cybernetic “ballet mécanique” of fluttering, wriggling arm movements the organism seems to develop and multiply, before it reunites for short but peaceful moment. “Il s'agit” offers an illusory and complex metaphor linking the human body to machine-like patterns and shapes.
Dance: Ugo Dehaes / Music: The syncopated elevators legacy + Petite porte de bronze
The stroboscopic trilogy
This triptych (2003 - 2005) continues De Bemels’ videographic exploration of movement, dance and the body with the aid of the stroboscope effect, which consists of alternating various video sequences frame by frame. This way a shattered perception of time, space and movement is created. The bodies on the screen seem to be made up of various layers, each enclosed in a time and space dimension of their own. This technique doesn’t merely generate an embodiment of the post-industrial body, which is more and more subjected to de- and re-construction as well as to infinite multiplication and alteration, but is also a metaphor of the post-modern identity: fragmented and ambiguous, schizophrenic and heterogeneous, in a constant state of flux. After all, in a society dominated by consumerism, cybernetics, mass culture and global media, the notion of identity seems to dissolve in an incessant mutation and replication of existent and combined identities. Here the human body is presented as the major source of self-exploration and expression of personality.
Courtesy of the artist