Vitesse: 2’000 m/sec

In the large room, Roman Signer unrolled two kilometres of detonation wire distributed in space depending on his sensitivity and, at each place of tension, he installed a camera on a tripod, that is to say fifteen apparatuses in various “stations”, forming integral part of the installation. A few days before the opening ceremony, an experiment was carried out: in the total darkness, at the time when all the diaphragms of the cameras are open, Roman Signer lit the detonation cord with a gun and the immediate explosion illuminated it like neon, at a speed close to that of the light, from where the title Vitesse: 2’ 000 m/sec. The instantaneous photographs of the illumination were then exposed in the room next to the installation.

The visitor has total vision of the installation, with on one hand the cord and the cameras and on the other the crystallization of the experiment by the photographs. He also discovers a second installation of Roman Signer and the photographs of the action in the kayak on the river “La Sarine”, realized during the opening ceremony.

Roman Signer is undoubtedly one of the Swiss artists closest to the vital dynamism. Using explosives, he crystallizes energy and dismantles the movements to reach the heart of things and life. It is in the still latent movement, the execution itself, or the integrality of the performance or sometimes by the omission of one or the other stage of unfolding, that the meaning of the speech is perceived.