In the face of ongoing shifts, actions become uncertain.
Rituals take the place of meaning.
Where structures become unstable, the function of action shifts. Repetitions take the place of explanation; processes stabilize without their meaning being secured. In this moment, rituals emerge not as fixed entities but as procedures: they produce repetition, concentrate meaning or suspend it.
Between everyday routines, play-based systems, and culturally coded practices, forms thus emerge that provide structure rather than interpret. Actions appear as a sequence, as a rule, as a loop. A temporary order that only takes shape in its execution, as we can witness in the scores of William Engelen, in which repetition, variation, and deviation intertwine.
This structure, however, does not remain stable. Perspectives shift, horizons shift; meaning arises situationally and is bound to the moment of its execution. Visible in the works of Hanae Utamura: memory, place, and body become legible here as intertwined practices.
The exhibition at boa-basedonart brings together works in which this ambivalence is evident: rituals appear as precise orders that carry meaning and elude it.
Works by Hanne Darboven, William Engelen, Shigeko Kubota, Nam June Paik, Ben Patterson, Takako Saito, Hanae Utamura, and others as well as incorporating culturally coded forms of practice such as the tea ceremony.
