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Translating: Chapter Two

Exhibition including two works as part of Bad Translation, a series of exhibition curated by Matthew de Pullford. One work 'A translation of La Sima (The Chasm) by Pio Baroja' was a collaborative piece with Naama Yuria; the other 'A Translation of The Tree of Science by Pio Baroja' was sole authored by me. This latter work was also shown in amended form at The Centre for the Study of World Civilisations in Tokyo University of Technology, Japan.

Both works in this exhibition developed a long-term interest in enacted processes of translation, but adopted a new and highly critical approach to previous works I had made in this vein.

The first work, ‘A Translation of El Arbol de la Ciencia (The Tree of Science) by Pio Baroja,’ is presented as an unfinished typewriter script of a translation of Pio Baroja’s novel, made unaccesible through being clamped under glass and onto a shelf with only the last page showing; the process of translation is in this case shown arrested, alluding to a loss of faith in the intent of the work. The second, ‘A Translation of La Sima (The Chasm) by Pio Baroja,’ made in collaboration with Naama Yuria, is a short narrative film that articulates the process of trying to make a work involving a translation of Pio Baroja’s short story; in this case the attempt to perform the translation is lambasted and the process turned in on itself.

This critical position is articulated in a paper ‘Earnest abnegation in perpetuity‘ in’Vicissitudes: Histories and Destinies of Psychoanalysis’ pub. Institute of Germanic and Romance Studies, London 2013 ISBN: 978-085457-234-2

The exhibition was part of the exhibition programme ‘Bad Translation’ curated by Matthew de Pullford for Crate. An adapted version of the video work, incorporating Japanese subtitles, was screened between 8 and 15 January 2010 at the Centre for the Study of World Civilisations, Tokyo Institute of Technology as part of the Art at Tokyo Tech 2009 programme under the title of ‘Translating: Chapter 3.” This exhibition was accompanied by a lecture and workshops expanding on the theme of the work, which were published in subsequent issues of the Institute journal (455 & 456), and by a small brochure, which usefully captures the dialogue and speech of the video.