A decade later - Fundação Luso-Americana

At times alone. At times accompanied. Was the world already there
before there was reflection? The small scenes explore, to the saturation
point, the enigmatic relationship between a double that is
either opposing or facing his double; they isolate the figures by
replicating them; they make us query the paradoxal originality of
the other, the one that reproduces by replicating itself infinitely,
conveying subtlety, tension, and deceptive fragility in seductive
but potentially aggressive body moves. We draw closer. The images
are fairly opaque, thick, dense, shadowy, obscure, faded almost
unfocused – can clarity be destroyed by clarity? – ill-defined,
precarious, somewhere between “fainting, falling, fading and
faking” (the title of a text by Delfim Sardo in Luxury Bound). Jorge
Molder, whose essentially photographic work is, according to a
number of critics, about “duplicity,” fences with an impressive
dearth of resources, with arguments that duel over the inevitable,
uncanny division of the self. What we see are small Polaroid images
taken from a number of video-recordings Molder made on
the movements of the body during a fencing match. Two bodies
– or figures (or maybe a duplicated body) are wearing the usual
white suits and protective masks that both conceal and reveal the
face. The naked hands relate to each other at different moments
though different poses/gestures, in an arena whose hazy background
is lit by a circular focus-light, expressively delineating a
here and now – hic et nunc – that is almost archaic, germinal,
seminal and symbolic, but one that immediately transports us to
a timeless before and after: “still not a not-any-more.” A past that
is the future perhaps. For João Miguel Fernandes Jorge, “the
Polaroids strengthen the potential reach of that living past.” As he
writes about Molder, he stresses the importance of “being ‘en
garde.’ The Duelers are his domain. In this work, the photographs
are his thoughts exactly. The on-target thrusts constantly lead us
to turn back to the photograph. They create a need for time – and
more time – to examine the consistency of a face that recoils in
flight (and fusion) at every instance into the blackness of the
background.” (text by João Miguel Fernandes
Jorge in the catalogue “Algum Tempo Antes/
Algun Tiempo Antes”, 2006). Discreetly revealed
is a paradoxical dialectic involving mirroring
and a seductive interplay of closing and disclosing
using two perspectives in each one of us,
without time and objective space: Il faut que je sois
mon extérieur, et que le corps d’autrui soit lui-même” (M.
Merleau-Ponty, Phénoménologie de la Perception).
The Polaroid series esgrimitas (the Fencers) is
cited over and over again in texts on Molder’s
career, but the texts rarely explore more than
the basics. The 1986 series with 8 x 8 cm photos
is complemented by two small black-andwhites
(the Polaroids are taken from
video-recordings and the photos are direct
shots) is a quasi-distillation of a number of
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FLAd ArT coLLecTion
Jorge molder
en garde
features, topics, and pivotal points of the types of discourse
Molder has produced since 1977. The concept of “series” has
been essential since the beginning, as the artist has asserted. Its
meaning is rooted in a “well-known philosophical concept,”
having temporal allusions, and references to belonging and other
attributes that are difficult to clarify. “I know very well where it
begins and eventually discover when it ends, I can manage to
understand the elements that it comprises but what escapes me
completely is the way it works and how it comes about.” (from
the artist’s website) Unfinished – with an alpha but no omega
– this series dealing with the world of fencing is a window into
a few of Molder’s obsessions: primarily topics related to personal
doubles or doppelgangers: an offshoot creature or a replica of
ourselves wandering around out there somewhere.
The fencers in these works “are beings that are a bit special,”
according to Jorge Molder. The clothes, gestures, and anatomy
of a routine that borders on the ritualistic bespeak ideas and
memories of a fundamental archetype that faces the impossible
challenge of the master stroke, the perfect rapier thrust, the
unstoppable, the purest creation illuminated by human talent.
It is a model of inspiration and efficiency which, because of
its nature, discloses a spirit of agony, in a silent duel with its
own image whose reflection seems to escape the boundaries
imposed by the artist, between rejection and retention, obsolescence
and ritual, in constantly imprisoned flux. As George
Kubler has said, “the replications that fill the story effectively
prolong the stability of many past moments, allowing meaning
and model to emerge whenever we turn our attention to these
moments. However, it’s an imperfect instability. Any replica
made by man differs from the model owing to minimal, unpremeditated
differences. The cumulative effects of these differences
act as a slow drift in relation to the archetype.” (A Forma do
Tempo). Perhaps like making a hit while avoiding being touched
by the foil. pedro Faro
A graduate in Philosophy, Jorge Mol‑
der (Lisbon, 1947) began his artistic
career in 1977 with a solo show
entitled “Vilarinho das Furnas (Uma
Encenação), Paisagens com Água,
Casas e Um Trailer.” In 1980, he
collaborated with poets João Miguel
Fernandes Jorge, and Joaquim Manuel
Magalhães on “Uma Exposição”. his
self‑depictions, coupled with strong
references to literature, movies, and
day‑to‑day life start to take shape in
1987 with several series of works.
In 1999, Molder is invited by Delfim
Sardo to represent Portugal at the
48th Venice Biennale, thus confirming
him as one of Portugal’s most impor‑
tant contemporary artists. he was the
director of the Calouste Gulbenkian
Foundation’s Modern Art Center from
1993 to 2009. Jorge Molder’s work
can be found in a number of distin‑
guished Portuguese and international
art collections.
Parallel no. 6 | FALL | WINTER 2011