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• Ocist-a-i-ec

• Samorin, Slovakia, 1995

A project for the former Synagogue of Samorin, Slovakia

In a town without a single remaining Jewish inhabitant, the question as to why acts of vandalism continued to plague the (absent) Jewish community fueled speculation. This building, it was plain to see, was a ruin. I listen to old brick and mortar fall as dust to the ground at my feet.

Opposite the building is a small shop, only then newly painted, where locals gathered and bought sundry things. A group of men sat talking, on the base of the Synagogues destroyed fence. At the other side of the Synagogue, a ‘neighbour’ placed their trash containers next to the side steps leading into the sanctuary.

My project involved placing rusted, cast iron sculpture on, around and within the Synagogue. By these acts I hoped to reassert the former spatial boundaries that the former house of worship once had.

On the destroyed gatepost I secured five iron ‘bottles of spirits’, like a phantom building, a silhouette or an echo materialized. In the absence of historical memory, what are legible symbols? A ‘book’ near the back fence, a cache of twenty odd ‘hand tools’ (for maintaining or destroying) loosely propped in the entrance vestibule or drilled into the façade; robust vessels, heavy duty cleaning 'agents' poised at the sidesteps and ten more figures inside.

This work took part in Yawning, curated by Milos Vojtechovsky. Organized by Jo Williams for the Hermit Center for Metamedia, Plasy, CZ. Yawning included works by Martin Zet, Charlie Citron and Milos Vojtechovsky.