Vincenzo Fiore Marrese

Artistic Research

Achilles and Tortoise Kornieieva-Marrese duo

Abstract

It is a research about identity fragmentation and the perception of the body through Internet technologies. The context is about cities in different time zones. Berlin is in the UTC+1, and Kyiv is in the UTC+2 time zone. There is a time zone gap of one hour. When people talk through the Internet, this gap seems to disappear. It seems strange. They remain in their cities but, at the same time, they are elsewhere. They are able not only to talk but also to see each other. They experienced a sort of bodies presence. But in what kind of space and time, this connection happen? It looks like they are close, but they are still far. This situation reminded us of the “Achilles and the Tortoise” paradox. It seems that technology can fill this gap through the fragmentation of ourselves. We are not communicating directly. Each of us communicates with a mathematical representation of the other that appears through the machine. Despite the time zone gap, we live the same present. But it is a present that seems possible and impossible, at the same time because only the fragmentation of ourselves allows us to communicate with each other. This paradoxical situation is experienced daily, by a lot of people, for different reasons. We felt the urgency to explore it through the prism of our art practice.