The problem of ethical-aesthetical determinism.

We all know that one of the features of the current epoch is evening out formal criteria of quality in art. Mechanisms of aesthetic choice ceased to be open and clear long time ago. They act in ways as complicated and unnoticeable, as the ethical choice. More than that, the opposition of ethics and aesthetics no longer appears to exist too. Nowadays ethical choice quite often is based on aesthetical value and vice versa. What’s our choice is based on: an inner imperative or influence of cultural environment? Divine predestination or freedom of will? Or maybe both, as orthodox theology says? Buridan’s ass still has to make its choice.

The installation consists of an abstract (virtual) figure of a skinless sheepwolf 3D-printed of hard plastic and coated with chromium, so that the surface is mirrored, and a pair of field stacks. One bundle is of natural sheepskins, while the other is of wolves’ skins. Individual self-identification is made on surface. Whether to be a lamb, or a predator? Who are we inside ourselves? The viewers are mirrored by the sculpture and have to “put on” these selfish questions.

Gor Chahal. Moscow, 20013. (Translated by Ivan Lukov).