Hrvoje Hiršl: Dimensions of the Line

Walk me through your creative process – do you start off from an idea or do you first collect sounds and sensations that will later make up the whole?

It was curiosity and the desire to understand the world around me that led me to art. I see art as a playground for exploring interdisciplinary themes that would not be possible in any other field. My interests range from art history and philosophy, to physics and mathematics, all the way to biology, psychology, and sociology.

My process typically starts with a topic that intrigues me. After delving into it deeper and performing research, I discover more layers than were initially apparent – so my works are “visualisations” of these explorations. Sometimes they are witty commentaries, other times, unexpected pairings of seemingly disparate things, attempts to uncover hidden structures...

The choice of the medium depends on several factors but usually comes down to the medium that might yield surprising results, in order to attract attention and provoke a reaction – viewing the topic with fresh “eyes”. I prefer mediums that relate the most directly to the conceptual point I’m trying to make.

The role of sound in my works is multifaceted – it functions as an extension of the visual, enhancing the theme and the overall impression, as an invisible yet distinctly physical force (movement of sound waves), easy to apply and control, and as a conceptual consequence of the sum of decisions happening throughout the organic development of the concept. It can either be a building block, as valuable as any other segment of the work yet not the main focus, or it can manifest as a by-product of previous decisions that defined the piece, while the sound operates within those parameters.  

 

Does the specific location influence the way you think about an installation? Do you prefer having more flexibility or stricter constraints in this regard? 

It all depends on the situation: whether I am doing a site-specific project or incorporating an existing project within a given location. Sometimes projects are inspired by a location, a historical or spatial detail that becomes the starting point – as with “Nodes”, which I exhibited in 2015 at DordtYart in the Netherlands within the space of a former shipyard. In this instance, the space possessed certain characteristics that become inseparable from the piece itself.

But this is quite rare; in most cases, I strive for my works to make the most of a given space and its characteristics, but it would be very limiting for future exhibition to tie the project exclusively to that location. I always make use of the formal characteristics of a space in my work; I think any artwork has to find a way to co-exist with a space, even impose itself on it, regardless of spatial limitations. This is simply a part of the “job” of setting up an exhibition.

Hrvoje Hiršl: Nodes

 

Does the audience need preparation in order to understand your works, what would you advise in this regard? How would you like the audience to experience your work at MBZ 33?

I believe my works can be viewed from multiple perspectives and starting points. Understanding them at the first level doesn’t require any knowledge of a specific discourse. I always aim to construct layered works, so that the first impression is comprehensible to everyone and leads to deeper meanings, that are hinted but not explicitly stated. I try to keep the work open, not tying it to a specific frame of time, so that it may keep communicating with changing discourses and themes over a longer period.

The project “Dimensions of the Line”, which I will premiere at MBZ 33, deals with the relationship between humans and space, their position within that space, and attempts to change it. This space is not only geometric, defined by XYZ coordinates, but also a technological one. The work examines the hidden dimensions within this space and the ways in which we change it, but more importantly, how it changes us. Can we even inhabit it – this space we are constructing? And if not, who are we constructing it for?

The project connects to my text “The Question of Scale” from 2016, about exponential technological advancement and its impact on the exponential shortening of time and space. The main premise of that text is the realisation that the space we are building has grown beyond our scale, to the extent that, ultimately, we can no longer interact with or inhabit that space/time.

From 2016 to 2020, I wrote a series of about fifteen texts. During the writing process, I realised I wasn’t referencing my existing works but instead talking about works yet to be created, which have grown out of those reflections and introspections.

Hrvoje Hiršl: The Question of Scale

 

Your work deconstructs ideas we take for granted; how do you interpret the idea of ‘broken relationships’?

The technological space we construct and the space we inhabit were once connected in a bodily sense – our physical capacities, perception, and the speed of our nervous system corresponded to the limits of space and time in which we lived. However, the exponentially fast technological progress has severed this connection, making the technological space too accelerated and ever-changing for our perception, and participation. The relation between temporal duration and the possibility of action has become so condensed that events within the technological space occur faster than we are able to process them or react – faster than the blink of an eye or a nerve impulse.

When time is disrupted and becomes inaccessible to our experience, space loses its function as a place of interaction and existence. This technological space is no longer built for us, but for the sake of its own governing laws of speed and efficiency, devoid of the ability to adapt to our human scale. Since we no longer have access to it, such a space becomes self-sufficient and self-serving. When we are excluded from participating in the space we construct, the question arises – who are we building it for?