Angelika Markul: explore, before it’s too late

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Angelika Markul actively seeks her challenges. An attentive witness of our time, humanity and our slow demise, — Angelika is not someone with an optimistic outlook for the future — she travels to the most hostile corners of the planet, or those most scarred by human activity.

When we meet in Markul in her Paris studio she is getting ready to leave for Argentina for the inauguration of a collective exhibition at Muntref – Centro de Arte Contemporáneo. This comes just three weeks after the opening of “Take me I’m yours” at the Monnaie de Paris where she is presenting a 3D printed work.

HAPPENINGTechnology, one of the most representative signs of the times, is closely intertwined with her practice. Markul also enjoys the company of scientists and during our conversation an ambitious project is on her mind.

Having already realized films in Fukushima and Chernobyl, Markel is going on a 15-day filming expedition in Yonaguni. For those who enamoured with locations that are difficult to access, this Japanese island is the dream. Here, 20 metres below the sea, the Yonaguni Monument

can be found. This pyramid, a man-made construction dating back five to ten thousand years, is to be the focus of the artist’s next project. She will be teaming up with Japanese scientist Masaaki Kimura the leading expert on these islands. Why the interest? “Because we haven’t been able to swim there for the last 20 years due to Fukushima.”

Sponsored by Agnès B and her galleries Leto and Laurence Bernard, she will head out to Yonaguni to realize a film which will be exhibited for the first time in March 2016 at the Muzeum Zamek Ujazdowski in Warsaw. Part of the structure, 30 metres long and 3 metres tall, will be reconstructed using two tonnes of wax, with the aid of 10 assistants over the course of a week. The exhibition will feature four new works, including Yonaguni and 4000 milliards de planètes.

“Angelika looks to provoke uncertainty, objects onto which viewers are able to project their own fantasies of what is lost and what is original,” explains curator Jaroslaw Lubiak.

It is impossible to separate the artist’s process from the final project with a personal engagement which precedes it. “All my work is very physical, it is not just a film, I have to train. Each work is born of a kind of performance that the spectator will never see, but is vital for me as an artist.”

When discussing human activity and the accelerating expansion of our universe, “we are already condemned” says Markul. But there is still time to analyse and react.

Where do we come from? Why are we here? What purpose does my life serve? What can I give? Are we alone? It is from science and action that the artist looks to respond to these questions. Having realized spectacular films in Fukushima, Chernobyl and Iguacu falls, Markul does not intend on stopping here.