Das tausendteilige Portrait
Friedl Kubelka vom Gröller
Das tausendteilige Portrait, 1980
"Lore Bondy 1000 Gedanken"
1150 black-and-white photographs, 5.8 x 5.8 cm each, vintage prints, baryta paper, dry-mounted on molino, handwritten text Part 1 438 black-and-white photographs, 116.7 x 277 cm, framed in acrylic glass box, 123,1 x 240,3 x 9,1 cm Part 2 449 black-and-white photographs, 116.3 x 260.4 cm, framed in acrylic glass box, 123.1 x 240.4 x 9.1 cm Part 3 263 black-and-white photographs, 116.2 x 259.2 cm, framed in acrylic glass box, 123.1 x 240.3 x 9.2 cm
GF0003094.00.0-2003
Artwork text
One Thousand Changing Thoughts is a portrait which consists of 1,000 individual photographs. It cannot be reproduced, cannot be translated into another medium, and its complexity cannot be absorbed. I have tried to keep the unity of time, place, and action to eliminate insignificant details and keep the viewer’s attention focused on the essentials. During the individual sessions nothing ever changed except the sitter’s thoughts, the strict immobility on her part and mine made the slightest change of her facial expressions perceivable. One Thousand Changing Thoughts is meant to be a photographic monument to my mother. Her thoughts combine past, present, and future. Because of the sameness of those 1,000 photographs, ordinary considerations such as age and beauty are rendered unimportant. What emerges is the human being. The number 1,000 is a symbol of my childhood, for desires which cannot be fulfilled. By producing a 1,000-part-portrait I try to satisfy this desire for the impossible. (Friedl Kubelka) Lore Bondy One Thousand Changing Thoughts, 1980 1 People 2 People 3 From early travels to 4 The travel through life 5 Optimistic thoughts 6 About group-therapy 7 Becoming a grandmother 8 A young dog—interhuman relations 9 Life—finding oneself 10 Emancipation 11 Diversities 12 H. 13 H. 14 On happiness 15 On misery 16 Secret thoughts 17 Secret thoughts 18 Mothers—hopes and worries 19 Dialogues 20 Group and anti-Semitism 21 Irmchen 22 Children—life—children of children 23 Vera—difficult upbringing 24 From positive developments to the possible destruction of life 25 Ödipus—connections 26 Images of childhood 27 Journey to Greece—possible love-affairs—about an interview with Henry Miller—thoughts about death, joy of life 28 Work 29 Fantasy 30 First pregnancy and first child up to the second year 31 A certain woman 32 Jura Soyfer—outsider 33 Wallnöfer 34 Aggressions against myself (the author) 35 Desire for children—value and worthlessness of life 36 A certain woman as an enemy 37 Experience with people at the health-resort 38 Development of a relationship up to the present 39 Reminiscences of my (the authors) development 40 Loneliness 41 Fear of the feeling of loneliness 42 Louise—I, a fourfold mother—my death—life still owes me something 43 Uli After every session you find the corresponding number.