In the Wintergarden
Neither Good nor Evil, but Beyond All Moral Categories
Where alter egos and trompe l´oeil bond
Neither Good Nor Evil, but beyond all moral categories (2005) and In the Wintergarden (2009) are installations based on photographic work. The works are installed in a staircase, in a corner or on a sliding door rather than being centerstaged. They have a wallpaper like quality, being something by referring to other places and blend into the surrounding. They are seen when passing by, fleetingly as a visual peripheral contact. Misleading and by being non-substantial they carry information of other rooms and alter the perception of the actual space they are installed in.
In the Wintergarden is a commissioned artwork for the City of Helsinki in 2009. The image is a large scale print, 2x5m and is located in the lobby of a kindergarten. The work is mounted on a wall that is moved to create larger or a more intimate space. The image is altering the architecture having a slightly distorted perspective and having some enlarged and added details.
¨ Lena Séraphin works with reproduction processes, repetitive movements, with the possibilities of overlapping experiences of rooms. The pictures bring together dimensions of spatiality, pairing them together in a way that would not be possible without the reproducing/reproduced picture. The experience melts together, forms a new room, and dresses one room as an other. Illusion, the shifting perception of a reality, becomes the essence of spatiality. ¨
Maria Hirvi, To take place – serious games with the heterotopias of art, 2005
