CRANIAL MUSEUM
30. 4.–6. 6.
Kristan Horton

ZAHÁJENÍ/LAUNCH 30. 4. 2021/12.00
MAX. 6 LIDÍ NAJEDNOU/
MAX. 6 PEOPLE AT ONCE

Podpoř SVĚTOVA 1 na Darujme.cz. Jestli chceš. / Support SVĚTOVA 1, if you want to:
https://www.darujme.cz/projekt/1204296

CRISTAN HORTON: CRANIAL MUSEUM
Roman villa. The late 1980s. An American architect, Stourley Kracklite, invited to Rome to construct an exhibition of until the 20th-century little-known French architect Étienne-Louis Boullée./// Hadrian’s villa.
Victor Emmanuel II Monument. Newton’s Cenotaph./// An architect/ An analog image/ An Ancient Roman belly/ A xerox machine - springing an endless series of copies/ Copies of an analog image/ A2 posters/ Copies of an image of a belly/ Of an architect’s belly./// An architect/ A bed - an island/ A space covered in reproductions/ Losing a direct relation to the original.

In the beginning, there was Chaos, and then came Gaia, and Uranus, and Corona. What seemed to be a practical tool to cross the distance and discuss the future reality transformed itself into reality. A dialog about an exhibition became a mental image of an exhibition that no one will ever see. Dozens of proposals, countless sketches, long pages of scribbled notes, 3D rendered visualisations and lists of references found their tomb within two digital inboxes - divided by the ocean - and their only physical connection might be located somewhere
in an undisclosed data storage facility. Gmails, unlisted or not recorded FaceTime calls, hours of sitting, and long circular walks around Horton’s studio. All lost. Lost in interpretation. What remained were just a few files stored on Google Drive, uploaded in Montreal, downloaded in Prague, sent to Signpek, printed, cut, shipped to Svetova,
spread around the space.

This is not an exhibition. This is a cenotaph. A cenotaph to an exhibition that might have occurred. A footnote to the dialog lead and energy spent. How far can you go praising the Gods of Digital Reproduction? How many copies of ideas in semi-random forms can you place on walls, and plinths, or TV screens to achieve a sense of reasonable satisfaction?
A lot, it seems.

Horton’s friend, David Armstrong Six, author of the poetry at hand in the gallery’s bathroom, proposed a solution for the unsustainable worldwide rotation of art objects. David is a sculptor. And David wants to be able to “dehydrate” his large-scale works (a prepatent solution applicable also to Horton’s work, and yours, potentially). To drain all the juice from wood, metal, or plastic, shrink it to a size fitting into a regular envelope (depending on what envelope standard your region provides, of course). Such an envelope can freely travel. Cross oceans, rivers, highways, mountains and lakes, forests, and urban hubs to reach its destination safely, to be pumped with all the formerly present ingredients and exhibited in large museum halls. This is not a Star Trek-inspired transporter; this is good old pre-colonial magic without the need for a wand. Yet, instead of swirling reappearing molecules or transfigurations, we had to do with Google Drive. This is the world we live in. This is A Cranial Museum For Everyone.

Green tape (CA) - Blue tape (CZ)
Toffiffee (CA) - Toffiffee (CZ)
Amazon Box (CA) - Alza Box (CZ)
Oasis Orange Juice (CA) - Happy Day Juice (CZ)
Bright orange 3D printing matter (CA) - Bright orange 3D printing matter (CZ)
Kapa Board (CA) - Kapa Board (CZ)
North American paper standards - too many numbers to compare, sorry, not sorry.

Horton’s practice exists deeply embedded within a vast network of artistic, cinematographic, architectural, or popcultural references, and one always needs to project some of them to truly grasp what’s happening in front of them while gazing at one of Horton’s works.
The Belly of an Architect (Peter Greenaway, 1987);
The Fly (David Cronenberg, 1986);
Laterna Magica (Sigmar Polke, 1994);
Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999);
Doctor Who (BBC, 1963 - now);
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (Stanley Kubrick, 1964);
Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly, 2001);
Dan Graham’s Home for America, 1966-1967…etc

Google one of them, do your research, or ask Zai or others from the gallery team, and suddenly the whole show would get a different meaning. It is up to you to read the presented material as you want, as always, of course, yet if you crave an explanation, here is one possible line of reasoning:

We opened a manifold, and the bursting air went in various directions as if there were some options, as if we would be talking about Claude Shannon’s Theseus (1952), and the mouse would have a choice which way to go through its maze. A plethora of mice replaces a singular entity (Horton’s Form Character Solution). The mice fully occupy their maze and therefore conquer it, no need to toy around with the question of free will anymore. Their pathways resemble geometrically transfigured intestines or a little net of swastikas going haywire. You just try to
choose. Intestines are filled with orange juice held by a man defined through his drinking, defragmented in his movement (Horton’s Orange Juice Man). His past, present, and future are one (as Kurt Vonnegut’s
Tralfamadorian’s in Slaughterhouse-Five, 1969). Orange juice mixes with sugared saliva from an excess of chewing - where would you leave your gum usually? - (Horton’s Ellie). Where is a space left for magnesium to ease your muscles? And now, here comes a moment to urinate or shit. And all that biological matter goes slowly to the ground, as recognition marks of something undecodable. The soil is filled with DNA till someone digs it out with a Promethean ambition to achieve independence and sustainability by constructing a nuclear reactor under his studio (Horton’s Walnut Nuclear Power Station). The belly is still in a state of disbalance, no matter how hard you try to correct your digestion habits. All those chemical processes are directly in line with the brain. And the brain is the King, or Queen, or a gelatinous matter which forces you to draw, automatically, meticulously. So you
place the results on the top of your head, into your personal exhibition space (Horton’s Cranial Museum). If I clearly stated that this is not a show but a cenotaph, there is a show within the show, the only real authentic show around here. And that is the one within the Cranial Museum. Drink your poison and shrink to walk around Horton’s skull (only it is not Horton's skull, but Zai’s). A Cranial Museum for Everyone.

Curator: Jen Kratochvil
Production: Zai Xu, Daniela Andaházyová
PR: David Laufer

The specific form of the event will depend on the current situation. We expect online and physical visits to be available – with a maximum of 6 people at the same time.

Visiting hours Tue–Fri & Sun 12–17.
Světova 1, Praha 8
Admission fee (and support at Darujme.cz) is voluntary.

We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.
Za podpory Státního fondu kultury ČR a Městské části Praha 8.

/CZ/

Konkrétní podoba akce bude záležet na aktuální situaci. Počítáme s online i fyzickou možností návštěvy – maximálně 6 lidí zároveň.

Možnost navštívit v Út–Pá 12–17 & Ne 12–17
Světova 1, Praha 8
Vstupné (i podpora na Darujme.cz) dobrovolné.

Za podporu děkujeme Státnímu fondu kultury ČR a MČ Praha 8.

CRANIAL MUSEUM
30. 4.–6. 6.
Kristan Horton

CRISTAN HORTON: CRANIAL MUSEUM
Roman villa. The late 1980s. An American architect, Stourley Kracklite, invited to Rome to construct an exhibition of until the 20th-century little-known French architect Étienne-Louis Boullée./// Hadrian’s villa. Victor Emmanuel II Monument. Newton’s Cenotaph./// An architect/ An analog image/ An Ancient Roman belly/ A xerox machine - springing an endless series of copies/ Copies of an analog image/ A2 posters/ Copies of an image of a belly/ Of an architect’s belly./// An architect/ A bed - an island/ A space covered in reproductions/ Losing a direct relation to the original.

In the beginning, there was Chaos, and then came Gaia, and Uranus, and Corona. What seemed to be a practical tool to cross the distance and discuss the future reality transformed itself into reality. A dialog about an exhibition became a mental image of an exhibition that no one will ever see. Dozens of proposals, countless sketches, long pages of scribbled notes, 3D rendered visualisations and lists of references found their tomb within two digital inboxes - divided by the ocean - and their only physical connection might be located somewhere in an undisclosed data storage facility. Gmails, unlisted or not recorded FaceTime calls, hours of sitting, and long circular walks around Horton’s studio. All lost. Lost in interpretation. What remained were just a few files stored on Google Drive, uploaded in Montreal, downloaded in Prague, sent to Signpek, printed, cut, shipped to Svetova,
spread around the space.

This is not an exhibition. This is a cenotaph. A cenotaph to an exhibition that might have occurred. A footnote to the dialog lead and energy spent. How far can you go praising the Gods of Digital Reproduction? How many copies of ideas in semi-random forms can you place on walls, and plinths, or TV screens to achieve a sense of reasonable satisfaction?
A lot, it seems.

Horton’s friend, David Armstrong Six, author of the poetry at hand in the gallery’s bathroom, proposed a solution for the unsustainable worldwide rotation of art objects. David is a sculptor. And David wants to be able to “dehydrate” his large-scale works (a prepatent solution applicable also to Horton’s work, and yours, potentially). To drain all the juice from wood, metal, or plastic, shrink it to a size fitting into a regular envelope (depending on what envelope standard your region provides, of course). Such an envelope can freely travel. Cross oceans, rivers, highways, mountains and lakes, forests, and urban hubs to reach its destination safely, to be pumped with all the formerly present ingredients and exhibited in large museum halls. This is not a Star Trek-inspired transporter; this is good old pre-colonial magic without the need for a wand. Yet, instead of swirling reappearing molecules or transfigurations, we had to do with Google Drive. This is the world we live in. This is A Cranial Museum For Everyone.

Green tape (CA) - Blue tape (CZ)
Toffiffee (CA) - Toffiffee (CZ)
Amazon Box (CA) - Alza Box (CZ)
Oasis Orange Juice (CA) - Happy Day Juice (CZ)
Bright orange 3D printing matter (CA) - Bright orange 3D printing matter (CZ)
Kapa Board (CA) - Kapa Board (CZ)
North American paper standards - too many numbers to compare, sorry, not sorry.

Horton’s practice exists deeply embedded within a vast network of artistic, cinematographic, architectural, or popcultural references, and one always needs to project some of them to truly grasp what’s happening in front of them while gazing at one of Horton’s works.
The Belly of an Architect (Peter Greenaway, 1987);
The Fly (David Cronenberg, 1986);
Laterna Magica (Sigmar Polke, 1994);
Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999);
Doctor Who (BBC, 1963 - now);
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (Stanley Kubrick, 1964);
Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly, 2001);
Dan Graham’s Home for America, 1966-1967…etc

Google one of them, do your research, or ask Zai or others from the gallery team, and suddenly the whole show would get a different meaning. It is up to you to read the presented material as you want, as always, of course, yet if you crave an explanation, here is one possible line of reasoning:

We opened a manifold, and the bursting air went in various directions as if there were some options, as if we would be talking about Claude Shannon’s Theseus (1952), and the mouse would have a choice which way to go through its maze. A plethora of mice replaces a singular entity (Horton’s Form Character Solution). The mice fully occupy their maze and therefore conquer it, no need to toy around with the question of free will anymore. Their pathways resemble geometrically transfigured intestines or a little net of swastikas going haywire. You just try to choose. Intestines are filled with orange juice held by a man defined through his drinking, defragmented in his movement (Horton’s Orange Juice Man). His past, present, and future are one (as Kurt Vonnegut’s
Tralfamadorian’s in Slaughterhouse-Five, 1969). Orange juice mixes with sugared saliva from an excess of chewing - where would you leave your gum usually? - (Horton’s Ellie). Where is a space left for magnesium to ease your muscles? And now, here comes a moment to urinate or shit. And all that biological matter goes slowly to the ground, as recognition marks of something undecodable. The soil is filled with DNA till someone digs it out with a Promethean ambition to achieve independence and sustainability by constructing a nuclear reactor under his studio (Horton’s Walnut Nuclear Power Station). The belly is still in a state of disbalance, no matter how hard you try to correct your digestion habits. All those chemical processes are directly in line with the brain. And the brain is the King, or Queen, or a gelatinous matter which forces you to draw, automatically, meticulously. So you
place the results on the top of your head, into your personal exhibition space (Horton’s Cranial Museum). If I clearly stated that this is not a show but a cenotaph, there is a show within the show, the only real authentic show around here. And that is the one within the Cranial Museum. Drink your poison and shrink to walk around Horton’s skull (only it is not Horton's skull, but Zai’s). A Cranial Museum for Everyone.

Curator: Jen Kratochvil
Production: Zai Xu, Daniela Andaházyová
PR: David Laufer
We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

The specific form of the event will depend on the current situation. We expect online and physical visits to be available – with a maximum of 6 people at the same time.

Visiting hours Tue–Fri & Sun 12–17.
Světova 1, Praha 8
Admission fee (and support at Darujme.cz) is voluntary.

We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

/CZ/

CRANIAL MUSEUM
30. 4.–6. 6.
Kristan Horton

CRISTAN HORTON: CRANIAL MUSEUM
Roman villa. The late 1980s. An American architect, Stourley Kracklite, invited to Rome to construct an exhibition of until the 20th-century little-known French architect Étienne-Louis Boullée./// Hadrian’s villa. Victor Emmanuel II Monument. Newton’s Cenotaph./// An architect/ An analog image/ An Ancient Roman belly/ A xerox machine - springing an endless series of copies/ Copies of an analog image/ A2 posters/ Copies of an image of a belly/ Of an architect’s belly./// An architect/ A bed - an island/ A space covered in reproductions/ Losing a direct relation to the original.

In the beginning, there was Chaos, and then came Gaia, and Uranus, and Corona. What seemed to be a practical tool to cross the distance and discuss the future reality transformed itself into reality. A dialog about an exhibition became a mental image of an exhibition that no one will ever see. Dozens of proposals, countless sketches, long pages of scribbled notes, 3D rendered visualisations and lists of references found their tomb within two digital inboxes - divided by the ocean - and their only physical connection might be located somewhere in an undisclosed data storage facility. Gmails, unlisted or not recorded FaceTime calls, hours of sitting, and long circular walks around Horton’s studio. All lost. Lost in interpretation. What remained were just a few files stored on Google Drive, uploaded in Montreal, downloaded in Prague, sent to Signpek, printed, cut, shipped to Svetova,
spread around the space.

This is not an exhibition. This is a cenotaph. A cenotaph to an exhibition that might have occurred. A footnote to the dialog lead and energy spent. How far can you go praising the Gods of Digital Reproduction? How many copies of ideas in semi-random forms can you place on walls, and plinths, or TV screens to achieve a sense of reasonable satisfaction?
A lot, it seems.

Horton’s friend, David Armstrong Six, author of the poetry at hand in the gallery’s bathroom, proposed a solution for the unsustainable worldwide rotation of art objects. David is a sculptor. And David wants to be able to “dehydrate” his large-scale works (a prepatent solution applicable also to Horton’s work, and yours, potentially). To drain all the juice from wood, metal, or plastic, shrink it to a size fitting into a regular envelope (depending on what envelope standard your region provides, of course). Such an envelope can freely travel. Cross oceans, rivers, highways, mountains and lakes, forests, and urban hubs to reach its destination safely, to be pumped with all the formerly present ingredients and exhibited in large museum halls. This is not a Star Trek-inspired transporter; this is good old pre-colonial magic without the need for a wand. Yet, instead of swirling reappearing molecules or transfigurations, we had to do with Google Drive. This is the world we live in. This is A Cranial Museum For Everyone.

Green tape (CA) - Blue tape (CZ)
Toffiffee (CA) - Toffiffee (CZ)
Amazon Box (CA) - Alza Box (CZ)
Oasis Orange Juice (CA) - Happy Day Juice (CZ)
Bright orange 3D printing matter (CA) - Bright orange 3D printing matter (CZ)
Kapa Board (CA) - Kapa Board (CZ)
North American paper standards - too many numbers to compare, sorry, not sorry.

Horton’s practice exists deeply embedded within a vast network of artistic, cinematographic, architectural, or popcultural references, and one always needs to project some of them to truly grasp what’s happening in front of them while gazing at one of Horton’s works.
The Belly of an Architect (Peter Greenaway, 1987);
The Fly (David Cronenberg, 1986);
Laterna Magica (Sigmar Polke, 1994);
Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999);
Doctor Who (BBC, 1963 - now);
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (Stanley Kubrick, 1964);
Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly, 2001);
Dan Graham’s Home for America, 1966-1967…etc

Google one of them, do your research, or ask Zai or others from the gallery team, and suddenly the whole show would get a different meaning. It is up to you to read the presented material as you want, as always, of course, yet if you crave an explanation, here is one possible line of reasoning:

We opened a manifold, and the bursting air went in various directions as if there were some options, as if we would be talking about Claude Shannon’s Theseus (1952), and the mouse would have a choice which way to go through its maze. A plethora of mice replaces a singular entity (Horton’s Form Character Solution). The mice fully occupy their maze and therefore conquer it, no need to toy around with the question of free will anymore. Their pathways resemble geometrically transfigured intestines or a little net of swastikas going haywire. You just try to choose. Intestines are filled with orange juice held by a man defined through his drinking, defragmented in his movement (Horton’s Orange Juice Man). His past, present, and future are one (as Kurt Vonnegut’s
Tralfamadorian’s in Slaughterhouse-Five, 1969). Orange juice mixes with sugared saliva from an excess of chewing - where would you leave your gum usually? - (Horton’s Ellie). Where is a space left for magnesium to ease your muscles? And now, here comes a moment to urinate or shit. And all that biological matter goes slowly to the ground, as recognition marks of something undecodable. The soil is filled with DNA till someone digs it out with a Promethean ambition to achieve independence and sustainability by constructing a nuclear reactor under his studio (Horton’s Walnut Nuclear Power Station). The belly is still in a state of disbalance, no matter how hard you try to correct your digestion habits. All those chemical processes are directly in line with the brain. And the brain is the King, or Queen, or a gelatinous matter which forces you to draw, automatically, meticulously. So you
place the results on the top of your head, into your personal exhibition space (Horton’s Cranial Museum). If I clearly stated that this is not a show but a cenotaph, there is a show within the show, the only real authentic show around here. And that is the one within the Cranial Museum. Drink your poison and shrink to walk around Horton’s skull (only it is not Horton's skull, but Zai’s). A Cranial Museum for Everyone.

Curator: Jen Kratochvil
Production: Zai Xu, Daniela Andaházyová
PR: David Laufer
We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

The specific form of the event will depend on the current situation. We expect online and physical visits to be available – with a maximum of 6 people at the same time.

Visiting hours Tue–Fri & Sun 12–17.
Světova 1, Praha 8
Admission fee (and support at Darujme.cz) is voluntary.

We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

/CZ/

CRANIAL MUSEUM
30. 4.–6. 6.
Kristan Horton

CRISTAN HORTON: CRANIAL MUSEUM
Roman villa. The late 1980s. An American architect, Stourley Kracklite, invited to Rome to construct an exhibition of until the 20th-century little-known French architect Étienne-Louis Boullée./// Hadrian’s villa. Victor Emmanuel II Monument. Newton’s Cenotaph./// An architect/ An analog image/ An Ancient Roman belly/ A xerox machine - springing an endless series of copies/ Copies of an analog image/ A2 posters/ Copies of an image of a belly/ Of an architect’s belly./// An architect/ A bed - an island/ A space covered in reproductions/ Losing a direct relation to the original.

In the beginning, there was Chaos, and then came Gaia, and Uranus, and Corona. What seemed to be a practical tool to cross the distance and discuss the future reality transformed itself into reality. A dialog about an exhibition became a mental image of an exhibition that no one will ever see. Dozens of proposals, countless sketches, long pages of scribbled notes, 3D rendered visualisations and lists of references found their tomb within two digital inboxes - divided by the ocean - and their only physical connection might be located somewhere in an undisclosed data storage facility. Gmails, unlisted or not recorded FaceTime calls, hours of sitting, and long circular walks around Horton’s studio. All lost. Lost in interpretation. What remained were just a few files stored on Google Drive, uploaded in Montreal, downloaded in Prague, sent to Signpek, printed, cut, shipped to Svetova,
spread around the space.

This is not an exhibition. This is a cenotaph. A cenotaph to an exhibition that might have occurred. A footnote to the dialog lead and energy spent. How far can you go praising the Gods of Digital Reproduction? How many copies of ideas in semi-random forms can you place on walls, and plinths, or TV screens to achieve a sense of reasonable satisfaction?
A lot, it seems.

Horton’s friend, David Armstrong Six, author of the poetry at hand in the gallery’s bathroom, proposed a solution for the unsustainable worldwide rotation of art objects. David is a sculptor. And David wants to be able to “dehydrate” his large-scale works (a prepatent solution applicable also to Horton’s work, and yours, potentially). To drain all the juice from wood, metal, or plastic, shrink it to a size fitting into a regular envelope (depending on what envelope standard your region provides, of course). Such an envelope can freely travel. Cross oceans, rivers, highways, mountains and lakes, forests, and urban hubs to reach its destination safely, to be pumped with all the formerly present ingredients and exhibited in large museum halls. This is not a Star Trek-inspired transporter; this is good old pre-colonial magic without the need for a wand. Yet, instead of swirling reappearing molecules or transfigurations, we had to do with Google Drive. This is the world we live in. This is A Cranial Museum For Everyone.

Green tape (CA) - Blue tape (CZ)
Toffiffee (CA) - Toffiffee (CZ)
Amazon Box (CA) - Alza Box (CZ)
Oasis Orange Juice (CA) - Happy Day Juice (CZ)
Bright orange 3D printing matter (CA) - Bright orange 3D printing matter (CZ)
Kapa Board (CA) - Kapa Board (CZ)
North American paper standards - too many numbers to compare, sorry, not sorry.

Horton’s practice exists deeply embedded within a vast network of artistic, cinematographic, architectural, or popcultural references, and one always needs to project some of them to truly grasp what’s happening in front of them while gazing at one of Horton’s works.
The Belly of an Architect (Peter Greenaway, 1987);
The Fly (David Cronenberg, 1986);
Laterna Magica (Sigmar Polke, 1994);
Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999);
Doctor Who (BBC, 1963 - now);
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (Stanley Kubrick, 1964);
Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly, 2001);
Dan Graham’s Home for America, 1966-1967…etc

Google one of them, do your research, or ask Zai or others from the gallery team, and suddenly the whole show would get a different meaning. It is up to you to read the presented material as you want, as always, of course, yet if you crave an explanation, here is one possible line of reasoning:

We opened a manifold, and the bursting air went in various directions as if there were some options, as if we would be talking about Claude Shannon’s Theseus (1952), and the mouse would have a choice which way to go through its maze. A plethora of mice replaces a singular entity (Horton’s Form Character Solution). The mice fully occupy their maze and therefore conquer it, no need to toy around with the question of free will anymore. Their pathways resemble geometrically transfigured intestines or a little net of swastikas going haywire. You just try to choose. Intestines are filled with orange juice held by a man defined through his drinking, defragmented in his movement (Horton’s Orange Juice Man). His past, present, and future are one (as Kurt Vonnegut’s
Tralfamadorian’s in Slaughterhouse-Five, 1969). Orange juice mixes with sugared saliva from an excess of chewing - where would you leave your gum usually? - (Horton’s Ellie). Where is a space left for magnesium to ease your muscles? And now, here comes a moment to urinate or shit. And all that biological matter goes slowly to the ground, as recognition marks of something undecodable. The soil is filled with DNA till someone digs it out with a Promethean ambition to achieve independence and sustainability by constructing a nuclear reactor under his studio (Horton’s Walnut Nuclear Power Station). The belly is still in a state of disbalance, no matter how hard you try to correct your digestion habits. All those chemical processes are directly in line with the brain. And the brain is the King, or Queen, or a gelatinous matter which forces you to draw, automatically, meticulously. So you
place the results on the top of your head, into your personal exhibition space (Horton’s Cranial Museum). If I clearly stated that this is not a show but a cenotaph, there is a show within the show, the only real authentic show around here. And that is the one within the Cranial Museum. Drink your poison and shrink to walk around Horton’s skull (only it is not Horton's skull, but Zai’s). A Cranial Museum for Everyone.

Curator: Jen Kratochvil
Production: Zai Xu, Daniela Andaházyová
PR: David Laufer
We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

The specific form of the event will depend on the current situation. We expect online and physical visits to be available – with a maximum of 6 people at the same time.

Visiting hours Tue–Fri & Sun 12–17.
Světova 1, Praha 8
Admission fee (and support at Darujme.cz) is voluntary.

We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

/CZ/

CRANIAL MUSEUM
30. 4.–6. 6.
Kristan Horton

CRISTAN HORTON: CRANIAL MUSEUM
Roman villa. The late 1980s. An American architect, Stourley Kracklite, invited to Rome to construct an exhibition of until the 20th-century little-known French architect Étienne-Louis Boullée./// Hadrian’s villa. Victor Emmanuel II Monument. Newton’s Cenotaph./// An architect/ An analog image/ An Ancient Roman belly/ A xerox machine - springing an endless series of copies/ Copies of an analog image/ A2 posters/ Copies of an image of a belly/ Of an architect’s belly./// An architect/ A bed - an island/ A space covered in reproductions/ Losing a direct relation to the original.

In the beginning, there was Chaos, and then came Gaia, and Uranus, and Corona. What seemed to be a practical tool to cross the distance and discuss the future reality transformed itself into reality. A dialog about an exhibition became a mental image of an exhibition that no one will ever see. Dozens of proposals, countless sketches, long pages of scribbled notes, 3D rendered visualisations and lists of references found their tomb within two digital inboxes - divided by the ocean - and their only physical connection might be located somewhere in an undisclosed data storage facility. Gmails, unlisted or not recorded FaceTime calls, hours of sitting, and long circular walks around Horton’s studio. All lost. Lost in interpretation. What remained were just a few files stored on Google Drive, uploaded in Montreal, downloaded in Prague, sent to Signpek, printed, cut, shipped to Svetova,
spread around the space.

This is not an exhibition. This is a cenotaph. A cenotaph to an exhibition that might have occurred. A footnote to the dialog lead and energy spent. How far can you go praising the Gods of Digital Reproduction? How many copies of ideas in semi-random forms can you place on walls, and plinths, or TV screens to achieve a sense of reasonable satisfaction?
A lot, it seems.

Horton’s friend, David Armstrong Six, author of the poetry at hand in the gallery’s bathroom, proposed a solution for the unsustainable worldwide rotation of art objects. David is a sculptor. And David wants to be able to “dehydrate” his large-scale works (a prepatent solution applicable also to Horton’s work, and yours, potentially). To drain all the juice from wood, metal, or plastic, shrink it to a size fitting into a regular envelope (depending on what envelope standard your region provides, of course). Such an envelope can freely travel. Cross oceans, rivers, highways, mountains and lakes, forests, and urban hubs to reach its destination safely, to be pumped with all the formerly present ingredients and exhibited in large museum halls. This is not a Star Trek-inspired transporter; this is good old pre-colonial magic without the need for a wand. Yet, instead of swirling reappearing molecules or transfigurations, we had to do with Google Drive. This is the world we live in. This is A Cranial Museum For Everyone.

Green tape (CA) - Blue tape (CZ)
Toffiffee (CA) - Toffiffee (CZ)
Amazon Box (CA) - Alza Box (CZ)
Oasis Orange Juice (CA) - Happy Day Juice (CZ)
Bright orange 3D printing matter (CA) - Bright orange 3D printing matter (CZ)
Kapa Board (CA) - Kapa Board (CZ)
North American paper standards - too many numbers to compare, sorry, not sorry.

Horton’s practice exists deeply embedded within a vast network of artistic, cinematographic, architectural, or popcultural references, and one always needs to project some of them to truly grasp what’s happening in front of them while gazing at one of Horton’s works.
The Belly of an Architect (Peter Greenaway, 1987);
The Fly (David Cronenberg, 1986);
Laterna Magica (Sigmar Polke, 1994);
Being John Malkovich (Spike Jonze, 1999);
Doctor Who (BBC, 1963 - now);
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (Stanley Kubrick, 1964);
Donnie Darko (Richard Kelly, 2001);
Dan Graham’s Home for America, 1966-1967…etc

Google one of them, do your research, or ask Zai or others from the gallery team, and suddenly the whole show would get a different meaning. It is up to you to read the presented material as you want, as always, of course, yet if you crave an explanation, here is one possible line of reasoning:

We opened a manifold, and the bursting air went in various directions as if there were some options, as if we would be talking about Claude Shannon’s Theseus (1952), and the mouse would have a choice which way to go through its maze. A plethora of mice replaces a singular entity (Horton’s Form Character Solution). The mice fully occupy their maze and therefore conquer it, no need to toy around with the question of free will anymore. Their pathways resemble geometrically transfigured intestines or a little net of swastikas going haywire. You just try to choose. Intestines are filled with orange juice held by a man defined through his drinking, defragmented in his movement (Horton’s Orange Juice Man). His past, present, and future are one (as Kurt Vonnegut’s
Tralfamadorian’s in Slaughterhouse-Five, 1969). Orange juice mixes with sugared saliva from an excess of chewing - where would you leave your gum usually? - (Horton’s Ellie). Where is a space left for magnesium to ease your muscles? And now, here comes a moment to urinate or shit. And all that biological matter goes slowly to the ground, as recognition marks of something undecodable. The soil is filled with DNA till someone digs it out with a Promethean ambition to achieve independence and sustainability by constructing a nuclear reactor under his studio (Horton’s Walnut Nuclear Power Station). The belly is still in a state of disbalance, no matter how hard you try to correct your digestion habits. All those chemical processes are directly in line with the brain. And the brain is the King, or Queen, or a gelatinous matter which forces you to draw, automatically, meticulously. So you
place the results on the top of your head, into your personal exhibition space (Horton’s Cranial Museum). If I clearly stated that this is not a show but a cenotaph, there is a show within the show, the only real authentic show around here. And that is the one within the Cranial Museum. Drink your poison and shrink to walk around Horton’s skull (only it is not Horton's skull, but Zai’s). A Cranial Museum for Everyone.

Curator: Jen Kratochvil
Production: Zai Xu, Daniela Andaházyová
PR: David Laufer
We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

The specific form of the event will depend on the current situation. We expect online and physical visits to be available – with a maximum of 6 people at the same time.

Visiting hours Tue–Fri & Sun 12–17.
Světova 1, Praha 8
Admission fee (and support at Darujme.cz) is voluntary.

We thank the State cultural fund of The Czech Republic and The Municipal District of Prague 8.

/CZ/