Dressed in a white shirt against a white background, Absalon looks us in the eye and screams his lungs out. Occasionally, he leans towards us to scream again. He screams until he's hoarse, then starts again. Are they cries of alarm, or despair? But, facing the screen, we can only remain powerless. Absalon seeks to establish contact, to interpellate us. The videotapes Bruits and Bataille contrast with the apparent calm of his constructed works: immaculate white spaces in which feelings and emotions do not, theoretically, have a place. These last tapes, shot just before his death, are in some ways complementary to his other works, since they reveal hidden violence. Highly autobiographical, they show Absalon confronting his own obsessions, attuned to invisible, threatening forces.

Cristina Ricupero