Spacy

A poem about self-referentiality of form, tautology of image, and multiple reflections of mirrors, which only simulate depth. Replace the surface of the mirror with the surface of a film window, and you have Takashi Ito, who will constantly reveal the impenetrability of the medium and its own powerlessness before the materiality of space and objects: the viewer deriving pleasure from the repetitive game of the medium with itself becomes a helpless captive of its spectacle, caught in the nonsensical (because it does not lead anywhere, all movement in the author's films is circular and therefore purposeless) delight in the visual power of the image, to the extent that he forgets to see that his powerlessness is merely a reversed reflection of the impotence of the medium itself (in Ito's works, the "camera" always collides with some walls without ever penetrating them, as in "Box," or it only penetrates them in an illusionary way, as in The Mummy's Dream, only to relocate to the beginning of another wall...). The impotence of the medium, which will never reveal anything, explain anything, or penetrate anything: the only thing it offers is the oblivion of this bare fact through the power of spectacle and infinite postponement (until the end credits) in the form of... what? The form of form, of course. Thus: a certain formal structure, which had primacy over content, becomes itself the content for another form on the next level. This is most evident at the end of "Wall". And if Ito were not smart enough not to attempt it (because then the sobering would come), he could lead this escalation of forms to infinity... (21.12.2016)