Ghost Trees
Abner Preis
The starting point for Abner Preis's three-month residence at the Ujazdowski Castle Centre for Contemporary Art was Stańczyk (a jester) from a famous painting by Jan Matejko. Stańczyk foreshadows a fatal decline with an abundance of time of, and perhaps even a time of clowning about. The encounter with history, as told by museum curators, artworks, fine literature, theatre, opera, and finally crafts as well as folk tales, immediately freed a network of meanings and intuitions, which Preis freely followed during his artistic quest. During this journey, nature constituted a great attractive force, especially the Białowieża Primeval Forest, which has recently been subjected to oppressions, undermining its existence.
Created by the artist, Ghost Trees is a choreography set on a black theatre space, incorporating movement, light, video as well as five improvised performances performed by invited artists. This will be an open interpretation of the subject of (the presence of) Ghosts expressed in various media and in the individual stylisticses of artists. Ghost Trees is not a summary of the end of Abner Preis's residence, but rather the next stage of his artistic research to which he invites the public.
