Different forces are joined in the self-sustained timber combination of a Fachwerkhaus. Fachwerken happens when various members join together in an energetic balance. In this assemblage of actions and reactions, they can generate impact, and therefore mitwirken. Aya Imamura’s "Suspended in Time" achieves a fragile balance between elements, which she found on the street in Nuremberg. A broken squared window structure and the skeleton of a chair are connected together by a thread after a series of measurements, calculations, and experiments. Tensions and energy flows between the found home objects and the existing space are lighted up by a white cold neon light, fixed on a camera tripod with a level. Symbolically linking photographic and construction processes together, Imamura’s work considers to which extent Nuremberg’s historical photographs and images have impacted its reconstruction after WW2. Like the veil of Veronica imprinted with Christ’s face, images not only carry with themselves the memory of a past reality but can also confer it authenticity and legitimation, fixing the same reality in time and directing our future actions. A dead person can still live in us through its image, whose power and fascination goes beyond material destruction. With a background in Japanese traditional printmaking, Imamura works in different media, from paper to photography, performance, and installation, researching on the power of images, tackling their fluidity and resistance in time.
Text by Luca Zordan
