The Absent Present, 2014

The Absent Present, 2010
Prefix Gallery, Toronto, Ontario

The Absent Present features three related video works: Pond/Auschwitz (2011), Reflection/Auschwitz (2011) and Web/Auschwitz (2011). Shot during the artist’s first visit to the site of the eponymous concentration camp, the works focus on natural phenomena found in the camp’s surroundings. As a result of uncharacteristically heavy rainfalls at that time, much of the site was flooded. This seeming liability ultimately inspired the artist to work with the water, utilizing its surface, raindrops and reflections to speak of the “absent present.”
Pond captures the effect of rain on the ashen surface of a small body of water. Reflection depicts what appears to be a window of light on the surface of a murky puddle, the dark liquid in continuous motion, stirring with the hint of a breeze. Web focuses on the subtle rise and fall of a complex network of fine threads that remains ostensibly undisturbed, unknown particles knitted into its tangled fibres.
In order to situate these video installations within the artist’s lifelong artistic practice, the exhibition also features Lehav (1993), an earlier sculptural installation that employs the reflection and refraction of light.

- Scott McLeod, 2014