Rhea Boyden

By Rhea H. Boyden

                                                                                                      Photo by Erin Reilly

Documenta 1

Not heeding the mangled faces and forgetting their importance, she wages a war of fairy tales. Only thinking of the proud bee hive and its self-centred importance in the world. But the magical bees and the honeycombs only mask the mangled faces, barbed wire and camouflage that we so easily forget, locked in our own silly dreams. Is there any importance behind this screen? How can one give so much energy to a game on a computer? It is senseless in the grand scheme of things. How can one fill a whole grand hall with meaningless scribbles in pastel that also make themselves so important behind their plush blankets. One can only see half the picture in this too. Half the picture on a screen, turned into a fairy tale, half the picture behind the blanket. Yes, we must look at the mangled faces as hard as it is to do. We must stare, as painful as it is, and not cover them in warm blankets. I am not all insane. Just a part of me. Just that little part that enables me to create something worth looking at outside myself and away from the screen. Why, oh why must a fly have a whole marble block all to itself under a crystal covering? That too deserves respect. A simple fly puts everything into perspective. You can’t stop the clocks, they keep on ticking, so to freeze yourself in this moment is pointless. Perpetual motion is all around. The screen creates the myth of the perfect. Sometimes a person never comes back from the event horizon. There is no turning back to the screen, you have smashed it and scared it away. You must find entertainment elsewhere and not regret the past. It served its purpose. I nearly missed this nice image here while staring at the screen. Here I can find time to meditate. Watching the lovely spinning tubes, filled with singing fish and flashing lights turning life into a playground. But wait, there is a gun! Do not forget the mangled faces! They will come back to you under your own plush blankets and make your flies of problems seem positively minute. Even the playground is sinister. You can never escape the mangled faces. They will always be there. Always.

Photo by Erin Reilly-Documenta 13

 Documenta 2

The seamstress can work hard to make a futuristic suit to protect us from the unwanted Nordic Nuclear energy. But will it make any difference? How can she sew such a garment on a machine made of wood that refuses to budge? Hours and hours go into carving out the fine and intricate curves of the wooden garment press. And all the work is lost in a protest that is dragged out of existence in the middle of the night. The banks and energy lords won’t listen to this. The plant will open anyway and they will drag away the Real Occupy Camp and leave the Art Occupy Camp there to try and quench our thirst for protest. ‘Oh, how quaint’ they may say. A faux white tent with the word ‘Greed’ written on it. Beware, Bankers! Art is more powerful than you think. It speaks a language that is beyond your scope.

Photo by Erin Reilly

Documenta 3

2 young women sit in a restaurant bemoaning the fact that they cannot find suitable mates. The Restaurant is aptly named ‘Il Convento’. At least the food is excellent. There is no modern map to help them chart their futures. The traditional maps have either been sucked into a black hole or burned in a lava flow from a volcano trapped in a dark hall. Art will rescue them for one day.

Photo by Erin Reilly

Documenta 4

There is no time to ponder an ocean wave in a landlocked city. Only the rushes can linger to enjoy that. The silver blinds are hanging over the train tracks and the clocks are ticking ever louder. The pistons are pumping and the mercury is rising. There is limited art for limited spaces and limited time to see it. Our calendar gives us more days than the Chinese, but still we must flee. German trains do not wait.