“… the element’s existence does not precede the existence of the whole, it comes neither before nor after it, for the parts do not determine the pattern, but the pattern determines the parts: knowledge of the pattern and of its laws, of the set and its structure, could not possibly be derived from discrete knowledge of the elements that compose it. That means that you can look at a piece of a puzzle for three whole days, you can believe that you know all there is to know about its colouring and shape, and be no further on than when you started. The only thing that counts is the ability to link this piece to other pieces…in isolation, a puzzle piece means nothing – just an impossible question, an opaque challenge. But as soon as you have succeeded, after minutes of trial and error“ or after a prodigious half-second flash of inspiration, in fitting it into one of its neighbours, the piece disappears, ceases to exist as a piece…”

Georges Perec

 

 

In 1979, Iliana V. Dimitrova participated in the V Republican Festival and Spartakiad at the Vasil Levski stadium. Iliana’s place was in block 4, row 21, place 131, this determined her exact position in the “background” of the Spartakiad. Iliana had a “background directing card”, which indicated where to sit and at what point to raise a flag with a certain color. In this way, she built a small part of the impressive mosaic images or slogans choreographed in the stands of the stadium The preserved archive of the girl reveals to us the path from the general to the particular in this system, and their interconnection. The reproduction of the physical seat of the participant with a papier-mâché from a photocopy of the same archive reverses the dynamics particular-general and drives the wheel backwards.

 

Variable dimensions