Slide Images

1 - Keren No. 4, 1999
Copper, Book
79 cm x 79 cm x 91 cm
31 in x 31 in x 36 in

2 - Keren No. 4, 1999, (detail 1)

3 - Keren No. 4, 1999, (detail 2)

4 - Keren No. 4, 1999, (detail 3)

Keren No. 4, 1999

It is sometimes by an accident that I find what is essential. When that happens I am reminded that I am a vessel through which my work comes into being.

I was intrigued by the rich reflection of copper, which led me to have a copper vessel (79cm x 79 cm x 91cm) constructed. I don’t really remember what I had in mind. I was playing at the time with different reflective surfaces and possibilities. The vessel became the container for various objects. One day as Denise Deshotel, a poet friend, visited me at my studio to work on a collaborative project, I put an open empty book standing on its end at the bottom of the copper vessel. It was with disbelief that I realized that when we walk around the vessel, we see the reflection of the book opening and closing on the interior walls of the vessel. This became Keren No. 4. There was no question that the pages of the book had to be blank.

“A la place de la pierre gravée, au fond du puits, Sylvia S. a posé un livre. Le livre, le lieu des noms. Le lieu de la mémoire de tous les hommes. Presque comme un miracle inexplicable, quand on tourne autour du puits, on voit, dans le reflet sur la paroi, le livre, lentement se refermer, et puis, lentement encore, s’ouvrir, et puis, lentement toujours, se refermer, une fois encore… Comme si le monde était le reflet d’un livre qui s’ouvre, se ferme et s’ouvre ecore…" "[...] at the bottom of the well, Sylvia S. put a book. The book, the place of name. The places of the memory of all people. Almost like an inexplicable miracle, when one walks around the well, one sees, in the reflection of the walls, the book slowly close itself, and then, again slowly open, and then slowly, close once again. As if the world were the reflection of a book opening, closing, opening, closing."

   - Wajcman, Gérard, Sylvia Safdie Autres territoires, pg.71 (English version), Pg. 39, (French version), 2000