LEXICON

HD Video, 6.12 min. metal puzzle box, 2012

Lexiconis a video of the artist and her child putting together a puzzle and thus deconstructing a particular time and place of importance. 

The puzzle depicts the artist herself with a friend in front of a building – Haus Wittgenstein. The image references an event from 1997, very important in her life as it marked her first trip to the “West” (Vienna, Austria) where she  participated in an interdisciplinary workshop that deeply influenced her art-practice. She stayed at the Bulgarian Cultural Institute Haus Wittgenstein at that time and since then always remembered it with a sentiment.

In this puzzle, the perfect house is a background. The centerpiece is a picture of the two friends. It reminds of a banal photo keepsake. The personal history is opposed to the historical monument. The main narrative in Kostova’s video is the conversation between mother and child. The word “lexicon” has double meaning – as a vocabulary (the mother trying to establish/teach her daughter and the second meaning is an old fashion storage for memories.The “important” story is overpowered by emotions that result in destroying the puzzle.In fact, the action in this video deconstructs the past by putting together the pieces commemorating that time and as a result fictionalizing it. The real puzzle is also present in the exhibition space as an object.Lexicon was created for the exhibition The Keyhole of Mr. Wittgenstein, curated by Boris Kostadinov and presented at the Bulgarian Cultural Institute, Haus Witgenstein, Vienna, 2012.